The gospel in the stars : or, Prímeval astronomy

DEC 11 1911

BL 240

.S44 1910

Seiss,

Joseph

Augustus,

182.

-1904

The gospel in

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Gospel in the Stars;

OR,

gnnubal gstronomg.

BY

JOSEPH A. SEISS, D.D., LL.D

FIFTH EDITION.

#... ra ndvza xae iv naatu Xptardc.

CHARLES C. COOK,

150 Nassau Street,

new york, n. y.

1910.

Copyright, 1884,
3y JOSEPH A. SEIS&

Westcott & Thomson,

SJtrtotypers and Electrotype* i

PREFACE.

It may seem adventurous to propose to read the
Gospel of Christ from what Herschel calls " those
uncouth figures and outlines of men and monsters
usually scribbled over celestial globes and maps."
So it once would have seemed to the writer. But
a just estimate of the case cannot be formed without
a close survey of what these figures are, what rela-
tions they bear to each other, whence they originated,
and what meaning was attached to them by the most
ancient peoples from whom they have been trans-
mitted to us. Such a survey the author of this vol-
ume has endeavored to make. From an extended
induction he has also reached conclusions which
lead him to think he may do good service by giving
publicity to the results of his examinations.

The current explanations of the origin and mean
ing of the constellations certainly are not such as
should satisfy those in search of positive truth.
Herschel characterizes them as " puerile and absurd."
They are nowhere to be found outside of Greece and
Rome and modern works which have thence derived
them. They are part of the staple in the theories
and arguments of infidelity. The more ancient and

3

6 PREFACE.

explanations to do away with the intended conclu-
sion as a 11011 sequitur. The argument of these in-
fidels is indeed fatally defective, especially in assum-
ing that the old astronomy throughout, and all the
myths and worships associated with it, have come
solely from the natural observation and imagination
of man, apart from all supernatural light, revelation,
or inspiration. With this starting-point unproven
and incapable of verification, and with the positive
assertions of all the primeval world and all the indi-
cations directly to the contrary, the whole argument
necessarily breaks down. Like all the efforts of
unbelief, it signally fails. But though the argu-
ment, as such, is false and worthless, it does not fol-
low that the materials collected to build it are the
same. For the most part, they are solid enough in
themselves, and the gathering of them was a valu-
able contribution to a better cause. The showings
made of the close likeness between the old constel-
lations and the Gospel are well founded, and can
now be illustrated to a much greater and more mi-
nute extent. But, instead of proving Christianity a
mere revival of old mythologies, they give powerful
impulse toward the conclusion that the constellations
and their associated myths and traditions are them-
selves, in their original, from the very same pro-
phetic Spirit whence the Sacred Scriptures have
come, and that they are of a piece with the bib-
lical records in the system of God's universal enun-
ciations of the Christ.

Gale, in his Court of the Gentiles, Faber, On Pagan

PREFACE. 7

Idolatry, Roberts, in his Letters to Volney, Haslam, on
The Cross and the Serpent, and the author of Pri-
meval Man Unveiled, have slightly touched upon the
subject, and furnish some materials in the direction
of the same conclusions.

Sir William Drummond, in his Origines, C. Piazzi
Smyth, in his Life and Work, and J. T. Goodsir, On
Ethnic Inspiration, also present some important facts
and considerations relating to the general inquiry.

A more valuable aid to the study of the subject
as treated in this volume is Frances Rolleston's
Mazzarotli ; or, The Constellations — a book from an
authoress of great linguistic and general literary at-
tainments, whom Providence rarely favored for the
collection of important facts and materials, partic-
ularly as respects the ancient stellar nomenclature.
The tables drawn up by Ulugh Beigh, the Tartar
prince and astronomer, about a. d. 1420, giving Ara-
bian astronomy as it had come down to his time,
with the ancient Coptic and Egyptian names, like-
wise the much earlier presentations, made about a. d.
850 by Albumazer, the great Arab astronomer of
the Caliphs of Grenada, and Aben Ezra's commen-
taries on the same, are, to a considerable extent, re-
produced in her book. Fac-similes of the Dendera
and Esne Zodiacs are also given in the last edition
(1875) of her work. And from her tables and refer-
ences the writer of these Lectures was helped to
some of his best information, without which this
book could hardly have become what it is.

If any others have treated directly, or even inci-

8 PREFACE.

dentally, of what is sought to be shown in this vol-
ume, its author has not discovered their records or
their names.

With but little, therefore, but the star-maps and
descriptions as given by astronomers, and such no-
tices of the constellations as are to be found in the
remains of antiquity and general literature, he had
to make his way as best he could. With what suc-
cess he has done his work, and in how far his con-
clusions are entitled to credit or respect, he now
submits to the decision of a candid and intelligent
public.

Festival of the Epiphany, \
Philadelphia, 1882. )

Table of Contents.

Uecture dfitzt.

The Starry Worlds 15— 38

The Sun — Vastness of the Universe — Objects of these Creations —
The Stars as Signs — Record the Promises of Redemption — ■
The Glory of God — The Gospel Story — How the Stars are made
to Speak — Star-groups — Figures of the Star-groups.

^Lecture Serontf.

The Sacred Constellations . . • 39~^5

The Constellations— The Zodiac— The Twelve Signs— Mansions
of the Moon — The Decans of the Twelve Signs of the Zodiac
— The Planets — The Constellations Divine — Age of the Con-
stellations— The Sabbatic Week and the Stars — The Alphabet
and the Stars.

ilecture 3If)trtJ.

The Desire of Nations 66-89

The Ethnic Myths of a Coming Saviour — Infidel Argument — The
Sacred Intention of the Signs traceable — A Covered Picture —
The Sign of Virgo — The Virgin's Son — Coma — The Desire of
Nations — The Double Nature — Bootes — The Great Shepherd-
Summary on Virgo.

Uecture dfourtf).

The Suffering Redeemer 90-113

The Sign of Libra — Commercial Idea in Christianity — The South-
ern Cross — The Cross as a Sign — The Victim Slain — A Turn in
the History — The Northern Crown — A Sneer Answered.

IO TABLE OF CONTENTS.

Hecture dFtftf).

PAGES

The Toiling Deliverer 1 14-137

The Ancient Mysteries — The Sign of Scorpio — The Suffering
Saviour — The Serpent — Ophiuchus — ^Esculapius — The Great
Physician — Hercules and his Twelve Labors — A Picture of
Christ

Uecture ictxti).

The Triumphant Warrior 138-161

The Sign of Sagittarius — Cheiron — The Hero-Prophet of Double
Nature — The Harp — The Lyre of Orpheus — The Universal Joy
— Ara, the Burning Pyre — The Under-world — The Dragon —
Origin of the Symbol of the Dragon — Slayers of the Dragon.

Hecture gebentf).

Death and New Life 162-188

Order of the Signs — The Sign of Capricornus — Type and Antitype
— The Church — The Mystical Union — The Myths — Spiritual
Conceptions — The Arrow — The Pierced Eagle — The Dolphin
— Death and Resurrection — Salvation through Atonement —
The Faith of the Patriarchs.

Hecture IStgfjtf).

The Living Waters 189-210

Water — The Sign of Aquarius — Promise of the Holy Spirit —
The Waters of Life — The Southern Fish — Pegasus — The Good
News — The Pierian Springs — The Swan — Lord of the Waters —
The Carried Cross — A Beautiful Picture — The Fountain Flows.

Hectute Ntntf).

The Mystic Fishes 21 1-232

Apostolic Fishing — The Sign of Pisces — The Myths — Twofoldness
of the Church— The Band of the Fishes— Cepheus— The Church's
King — Andromeda — The Church in this World — Andromeda's
Chains — Ill-favor of the Church — Church not from the Signs.

TABLE OF CONTENTS. II

ILccture Cent!).

PAGES

The Blessed Outcome 233-257

The Lamb in Heaven— The Sign of Aries— The Mythic Stories
—Cassiopeia— The Church Delivered— Cetus— Satan Bound-
Perseus — The Myths — Perseus and Christ— Medusa's Head—
The Church's Hope— Union with the Church.

Hecture lElebentf)*

The Day of the Lord 258-284

A Psalm of Redemption— The Unicorn, or Reem— The Judgment
— The Sign of Taurus — The Myths — The Sacred Prophecies —
Orion — The Glorious Prince — Myths on Orion — Eridanus — The
River of Fire — Mercy in Judgment — Auriga — The Great Shep-
herd— A Solemn Outlook.

Hecture Ctoelfti).

The Heavenly Union 285-310

The Sign of Gemini — Mythic Accounts — The Star-names —
Christ's Union with His Church — The Marriage of the Lamb
— Lepus, the Mad Enemy — Sirius, or the Nazseirene — The
Sublime Prince — The Companion of Sirius — The Myths —
Summary on Gemini.

Eectute flTfjttteentf).

The Blessed Possession 31 1-335

The Oath of God— The Sign of Cancer— The Crab— The Scara-
basus — Praesepe — The Heavenly Rest — The Myths — The Names
—Ursa Minor— The Lesser Sheepfold— The Pole-Star— Ursa Ma-
jor— The Greater Sheepfold — Argo — The Names — The Treasure
Secured — A Sweet Consolation.

Uecture jFnurteentf).

The Consummated Victory 336-360

The Lion — Christ as the Lion — The Lion-work — The Sign of
Leo — Hydra — The Serpent Deceiver — Myths and Names — Cra-
ter, or the Cup of Wrath — Corvus, or the Raven — Career and
Fate of the Serpent— The End.

PAGES

12 TABLE OF CONTENTS.

lecture jFtfteentf).

The Secrets of Wisdom 361

Things More than they Seem- The Ground thus Far— The Lunar
Zodiac — Names of the Lunar Mansions— Record the Story of
Redemption — The Milky Way — Signs in and on this Way —
Names of the Primeval Patriarchs— The Names, Standards, and
Jewel-representatives of the Twelve Tribes of Israel — The Jewel-
foundations of the New Jerusalem.

Uecture Sixteenth

Primeval Man 387-423

Age of Astronomy— Dates back to Adam's Time — The Facts

The Traditions — The Bible Representations — Reasonableness
of the Case— Claimed to be Originally from God — The Star-
Record itself— Contents of its Three Books— Inevitable Infer-
ences— The First Man not a Gorilla — Revelation a Fact.

ILecture Seventeenth

The Star of Bethlehem 424-452

Visit of the Magi — Diverse Opinions about the Star — Astronomic
Facts — A Primitive Tradition — A New Star in Coma— Con-
junctions of Jupiter and Saturn— The Sign of the Fishes— The
Following of the Star — Junction of Prophecy and Astronomy —
Who the Magi were— Sum of the Whole — Conclusion.

Supplement.

{New Matter.)
Notices of this Book — Criticisms — No Champion for the Current
Theories — The Southern Cross — Is one of the Ancient Signs —
Dr. Seyffarth— Origin of Language and Writing — Science and
the Constellations — The Bible and the Constellations — The
Book of Job — The Hebrew Prophets — The New Testament —
The Star Bible 453

Index, and Glossary of the Star-names 511

The profoundest riddles of the world have often remained con-
cealed, not because of their great intricacy, but because of their
exceeding simplicity. — CzOLBE.

When truth is found, it always proves to be somewhat like the
egg of Columbus. — Schelling.

It is the pert, superficial thinker who is generally the strongest
in all kinds of unbelief. — Sir Humphry Davy.

" Why did not somebody teach me the constellations and make
me at home in the starry heavens, which are always overhead, and
which I don't half know to this day?" — Thomas Carlyle.

' This prospect vast, what is it ? — Weighed aright,
'Tis Nature's system of divinity;
'Tis Elder Scripture, writ by Go 1's own hand :
Scripture authentic ! uncorrupt by man."

Edward Young.

" The mvsteries of the Incarnation, from the Conception on to the
Ascension i.ito heaven, are shown us on the face of the sky, and are
signified oy the stars." — Albertus Magnus.

14

THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

JLecture jfitst

THE STARRY WORLDS.

Gen. i : 14 : " And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament
of the heaven to divide the day from the night ; and let them be for
signs, and for seasons, and for days, and for years."

THE sublimest visible objects of human
contemplation are the Starry Heavens.
The beholder is awed at every thoughtful
look upon them. And when viewed in the
lieht of astronomical science the mind is over-
whelmed and lost amid the vastness and mag-
nificence of worlds and systems which roll
and shine above, around and beneath us.

The Sun.
The most conspicuous, to us, of these won-
derful orbs is the Sun. Seemingly, it is not
as large as the wheel of a wagon, but when
we learn that we see it only at the distance

15

1 6 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

of more than ninety-one millions of miles,
and consider how the apparent size of objects
diminishes in proportion to their remoteness,
we justly conclude that it must be of enor-
mous magnitude to be so conspicuous across
a gulf so vast. Our earth is a large body ;
it takes long and toilsome journeying for a
man to make his way around it. But the Sun
fills more than a million times the cubic space
filled by the earth. A railway-train running
thirty miles an hour, and never stopping,
could not go around it in less than eleven
years, nor run the distance from the earth to
the Sun in less than three hundred and sixty
years. If we were to take a string long
enough to reach the moon, and draw a circle
with it at its utmost stretch, the Sun would
still be six times larger than that circle. Be-
longing to the system of which it is the centre
there are eight primary planets, some of them
more than a thousand times larger than our
earth, besides eighty-five asteroids, twenty-
one satellites or moons, and several hundred
comets. But the Sun itself is six hundred
times greater than all these planets and their
satellites put together. The greatest of them
might be thrown into it, and would be to it
no more than a drop to a bucket, a bird-shot

VASTNESS OF THE UNIVERSE. 1 7

to a cannon-ball, or an infant's handful to a
bushel measure.

The Vastness of the Universe.
But, great and glorious as the Sun is, and
seemingly so much greater than every other
object in the sky, it is really only a tiny frag-
ment, a mere speck, in the magnificent starry
empire of which it is a part. It is less to the
material universe at large than a globule to
our globe. With all its retinue of ponderous
orbs, it is only one of innumerable hosts of
such suns and systems. There are myriads
of stars in space immeasurably greater than
it. They look very diminutive in comparison
with it, but they are hundreds of thousands
of times farther off. A ball shot from a can-
non and moving at the rate of five hundred
miles an hour could not reach the nearest of
them in less than thirteen millions of years.
Light is the rapidest of known travellers.
A ray from the Sun reaches us in about eight
and a quarter minutes. But there are some
stars in these heavens known to be so remote
that if a ray of light had started from them
direct for our world when Adam drew his
first breath, it would hardly yet have reached
the earth. Sirius alone gives out nearly four

2* B

1 8 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

hundred times as much light as the Sun, and
yet Sirius is a star of moderate size among
the stars. The Sun is no more to many other
stars than one of our smaller planets is to it.
We know that the Sun turns on its axis as
the earth turns, and that it is ever moving on
a journey around some transcendently greater
centre, just as the earth and other planets
revolve around it as their centre. It takes
the earth one year to complete its revolution
around the Sun, but it takes the Sun eighteen
millions of our years to make its revolution
around the centre which it obeys.

We are amazed and overwhelmed in the
contemplation of worlds and systems so vast.
But there is solid reason for believing that all
these tremendous systems, in which uncounted
suns take the place of planets, are themselves
but satellites of still immeasurably sublimer
orbs, and thus on upward, through systems on
systems, to some supreme physical Omnipo-
tent, where the unsearchable Jehovah has
His throne, and whence He gives forth His
invincible laws to the immensity of His glori-
ous realm.

These are the " lights," light-bearers, or
luminaries to which the text refers, and which
the potent creative Word has brought into

OBJECTS OF THESE CREATIONS. 1 9

being and placed in die firmament of the
heaven.

Objects of these Material Creations.

Such wonderful creations of almighty pow-
er and wisdom were not without a purpose.
It was the will of the eternal God to be known
— to have creatures to understand and enjoy
His glory — to provide for them suitable
homes — to acquaint them with His intelli-
gence, power, and perfections — to fill them
with a sense of the existence and potent pres-
ence of an infinite creative Mind, from which
all things proceed and on which all creatures
depend.

All the purposes of creation we cannot be-
gin to fathom or comprehend. No plummet-
line of human understanding- can reach the
bottom of such depths. We stand on solid
ground, however, when we say and believe
that the intent of the physical universe is to
declare and display the majesty and glory of its
Creator. Hence the apostolic assertion : "The
invisible things of Him from the creation of
the world are clearly seen, being understood
by the things that are made, even His eternal
power and Godhead." But the particular ends
and objects included in this grand purpose

20 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

are as multitudinous and diverse as the things
themselves. Among the rest, there is one
specially expressed and emphasized in the
text. When God created these heavenly
worlds He said, "And let them be for signs."

The Stars as Signs.

A sign is something arbitrarily selected and
appointed to represent some other thing. The
letters of the alphabet are "signs" — signs of
sounds and numbers. The notes on a clef of
musical writing are "signs" — signs of the
pitch and value of certain tones of voice or
instrument. There is no relation whatever
between these " signs" and the things they
signify, except that men have agreed to em-
ploy them for these purposes. Their whole
meaning as " signs" is purely conventional
and arbitrary — something quite beyond and
above what pertains to their nature. And so
with all " signs."

When Moses said that the swarm of flies
should be a "sign" to the Egyptians, there
was nothing in the nature of the thing to
show what was thereby signified. When the
prophet told Hezekiah that the going back
of the shadow on the dial should be a " sign "
that he would recover from his sickness,

THE STARS AS SIGNS. 21

live yet fifteen years, and see Jerusalem
delivered out of the hand of the Syrian in-
vader, there was nothing in the nature of the
thing to express this gracious meaning. Isa-
iah's walking barefoot had no natural connec-
tion with the Syrian conquest of Egypt, and
yet this was " for a sign" of that fact. And
thus when God said of the celestial lumina-
ries, "and let them be for signs" He meant
that they should be used to signify something
beyond and additional to what they evidence
and express in their nature and natural offices.
Nor can any sense be attached to the words,
consistent with the dignity of the record, with-
out admitting that God intended from the be-
ginning that these orbs of light should be
made to bear, express, record, and convey
some special teaching different from what is
naturally deducible from them.

What the stars were thus meant to signify,
over and above what is evidenced by their
own nature, interpreters have been at a loss
to tell us. And yet there should not be such a
total blank on the subject. Light has been at
hand all the while. For ages this whole field
has been almost entirely left to a superstitious
and idolatrous astrology, which has befouled
a noble and divine science and done immeas-

22 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

urable damage to the souls of men. But we
here find it claimed to be a sacred domain laid
out of God in the original intent of creation
itself. And when I look at the deep and al-
most universal hold which a spurious and
wicked treatment of this field has so long
had upon mankind, I have been the more led
to suspect the existence of some original,
true, and sacred thing back of it, out of which
all this false science and base superstition has
grown, and of which it is the perversion.
There is no potent system of credulity in the
world which has not had some great truth at
the root of it. Evil is always perverted good,
as dirt is simply matter out of place. It is
the spoliation of some better thing going be-
fore it. And so there is reason to think that
there is, after all, some great, original, divine
science connected with the stars, which as-
trology has prostituted to its own base ends,
and which it is our duty to search out and
turn to its proper evangelic use.

" As from the oldest times the suns and
other worlds have been arranged into groups,
is it not allowable to inquire whether there
was not a unity of purpose and connected
meaning in them, though these grotesque
figures are represented as hieroglyphs which

THE STARS AS SIGNS. 23

we trace to the Chaldeans and Phoenicians ?"
is a question which Ingemann, the distinguished
Danish author, puts, and who was by far more
persuaded of their probable reference to di-
vine revelations than of their origin as more
commonly explained.

Richer, a French writer, has repeatedly as-
serted that the whole primitive revelation may
be traced in the constellations.

Albumazer describes the various constella-
tions as known over all the world from the
beginning, and says, " Many attributed to
them a divine and prophetic virtue."

Cicero, in translating the account of the
constellations by Aratus, says, " The signs are
measured out, that in so many descriptions
divine wisdom might appear."

Roberts, in his Letters to Volney, accepts it
as a truth that the emblems in the stars refer
to the primeval promise of the Messiah and
His work of conquering the Serpent through
His sufferings, and traces out some of the
particular instances.

Dupuis, in L Origine des Cultus, has col-
lected a vast number of traditions prevalent
in all nations of a divine person, born of a
woman, suffering in conflict with a serpent,
but triumphing over him at last, and finds the

24 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

same reflected in the figures of the ancient
constellations.

Dr. Adam Clarke says of the ancient Egyp-
tians that they held the stars to be symbols
of sacred things. Lucian and Dupuis assert
the same, and say that " astronomy was the
soul of the Egyptian religious system." The
same is equally true of the Chaldeans and
Assyrians.

Smith and Sayce, in The Chaldean Account
of Genesis, say : " It is evident, from the open-
ing of the inscription on the first tablet of
the great Chaldean work on astrology and as-
tronomy, that the functions of the stars were,
according to the Babylonians, to act not only
as regulators of the seasons of the year, but
also used as signs ; for in those ages it was
generally believed that the heavenly bodies
gave, by their appearance and positions, signs
of events which were coming on the earth!'

The learned G. Stanley Faber admits the
connection between the starry emblems and
the myths and mysteries of the ancients. He
thinks " the forms of men and women, beasts
and birds, monsters and reptiles, with which
the whole face of heaven has been disguised,
are not without their signification" and allows
that the reference, in parts at least, is to the

THE STARS AS SIGNS. 25

Seed of the woman, and His bruising of the
Serpent.

It is furthermore a matter of inspired New-
Testament record that certain wise men from
among the Gentile peoples not only looked
to the stars as by some means made to refer
to and represent a coming Saviour, even the
Lord Jesus himself, but were so moved and
persuaded by their observations of the stars,
from what they saw there signified, that they
set out under the guidance of those starry
indications to find Him whom they thus per-
ceived to have been born in Judea, in order
that they might greet Him as their Lord and
honor Him by their adoration and their gifts
(Matt. 2:1-11). All that entered into this
case we may not now be able to determine,
but the fact remains that these wise men of
the Gentiles did actually come to Jerusalem,
and thence to Bethlehem, to find and worship
the new-born Saviour, moved and led by as-
tronomic sigits, which they never could have
understood as they did if there had not been
associated with the stars some definite evan-
gelic prophecies and promises which they
could read, and believed to be from God.

And since these starry emblems are inva-
riably connected with the most striking and
3

26 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

sublime appearances in the visible creation,
seen in all climates, accompanying the out-
wandering tribes of man in all their migra-
tions, why should we not expect to find among
the names and figures annexed to them some
memorial of great and universal importance
to the whole human race ? Certainly, if we
could find connected with every constellation
and each remarkable star some divine truth,
some prophetic annunciation, some important
revelation or fact, there would be opened to
us a field of grand contemplations and of
sublime memorializations which we may well
suppose the infinite Mind of God would
neither overlook nor leave unutilized.

For my own part, having investigated the
subject with such aids as have been within
my reach, I am quite convinced, as much from
the internal evidences as the external, that
the learned authoress of Mazzaroth was cor-
rect in saying that from the latent significance
of the names and emblems of the ancient
astronomy " we may learn the all-important
fact that God has spoken — that He gave to the
earliest of mankind a revelation, equally im-
portant to the latest, even of those very
truths afterward written for our admonition
*n whom the ends of the world are come."

THE GLORY OF GOD. 2f

Taken along with the myths and traditions
which have been lodged among all the na-
tions, I am quite sure that we have here a
glorious record of primeval faith and hope,
furnishing a sublime testimony to the antici-
pations of the first believers, and at the same
time an invincible attestation to the blessed
Gospel on which our expectations of eternal
life are built. Not to the being and attributes
of an eternal Creator alone, but, above all, to
the specific and peculiar work of our redemp-
tion, and to Him in whom standeth our salva-
tion, are these "lights in the firmament" the
witnesses and "signs"

The Glory of God.

One of the sublimest of the Psalms, which
celebrates the twofold world of Nature and
Revelation, begins with the ever-memorable
assertion, " The heavens declare the glory of
God!' What the heavens are thus said to
declare certainly includes more than the ce-
lestial bodies naturally tell concerning their
Creator. Their showing forth of His " handi-
work," His wisdom and power, is the subject
of a separate and distinct part of the grand
sentence.

The chief "glory of God" cannot be learn-

28 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

cd from Nature alone, simply as Nature. The
moral attributes of Deity, and His manifesta-
tions in moral government, are pre-eminently
His glory. In the sending, incarnation, per-
son, revelations, offices, and achievements of
Jesus Christ, above all, has God shown forth
His glory. We are told in so many words
that Christ is " the image and glory of God ;"
nay, " the brightness — the very outbeaming —
of His glory." The glory of God is " in the
face of Jesus Christ." There can therefore
be no full and right declaring of " the glory
of God" which does not reach and embrace
Christ, and the story of redemption through
Him. But the starry worlds, simply as such,
do not and cannot declare or show forth
Christ as the Redeemer, or the glory of God
in Him. If they do it at all, they must do it
as " signs," arbitrarily used for that purpose.
Yet the Psalmist affirms that these heavens
lo " declare the glory of God." Are we not
therefore to infer that the story of Christ
and redemption is somehow expressed by
the stars ? David may or may not have so
understood it, but the Holy Ghost, speaking
through him, knew the implication of the
words, which, in such a case, must not be
stinted, but accc pted in the fullest sense they

THE GOSPEL STORY. 29

will bear. And as it is certain that God
meant and ordained a use of the heavenly
bodies in which they should " be for signs"
and as we are here assured that what they
have been arranged to signify is " the glory
of God" there would seem to be ample
scriptural warrant for believing that, by spe-
cial divine order and appointment, the illus-
tration of God's moral government, partic-
ularly as embraced in the story of sin, and
redemption by Jesus Christ, is to be found in
the stars, according to some primordial and
sacred system of astronomy.

Thus, by way of the Bible itself, we reach
the idea of the Gospel in the Stars, which
it is my purpose, with the help of God, to
identify, illustrate, and prove.

The Gospel Story.
The Gospel is chiefly made up of the story
of the Serpent and the Cross — the doctrine
of the fall and depravity of man through the
subtlety of "the Dragon, that old Serpent,
called the Devil and Satan, which deceiveth
the whole world," and the recovery of fallen
man through a still mightier One, who comes
from heaven, assumes human nature, and by
suffering, death, and exaltation to the right
3*

30 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

hand of supreme dominion, vanquishes the
Dragon and becomes the Author of eternal
salvation. The preaching of this is the
preaching of the Gospel, and the earnest and
hopeful belief of this is the belief of the
Gospel, according to the Scriptures and all
the accepted Creeds of the Church from the
days of the apostles till now.

The same was also known and believed
from the earliest periods of human existence.
The Bible is particular to tell us, in its very
first chapters, of a subtle and evil spirit,
contemplated and named as " the Serpent,"
through whose agency Eve was beguiled, and
the human race, then consisting of but two
persons, brought into sin, condemnation and
death. It is equally particular to tell us in the
same chapter that while Adam was yet in Par-
adise, though guilty and about to be driven out
into an adverse world, the Lord pronounced
a sentence on the Serpent, in which He gave
forth the comprehensive primordial Gospel
promise; with all the fundamental elements
of the true and only evangelic faith : " And
the Lord said unto the serpent, Becatise thou
hast done this, thou art cursed. . . . And I will
put enmity between thee and the woman, and
betweeii her Seed and thy seed ; it (He) shall

THE GOSPEL STORY. 31

bruise thy head, arid thou shalt bruise His heel "
(Gen. 3: 14, 15).

From the most sacred and authoritative of
records we thus find the original of all le-
gends and myths of the Serpent and his De-
stroyer, of the conflict with the Dragon, and
the ultimate slaying of him by that mighty
One to be born of woman ; who would have
to toil and suffer indeed, but would not give
over till His victory should be complete. In
that one pregnant text we identify the Ser-
pent and the Cross — the Prince of Evil and
the Prince of Peace — the Dragon-Deceiver
and the suffering Redeemer — the deadly ma-
lignity of the one and the self-sacrificing be-
neficence of the other — an irreconcilable feud
between them, with a promised crushing out
of the Destroyer by the wounded Saviour.
In other words, we thus, from the very begin-
ning of human history, come upon and iden-
tify the one great master-theme of both Tes-
taments, the chief substance of all prophecy
and promise, and the sum of all evangelic
preaching, faith, and hope, from the founda-
tion of the world. And what I propose to
show in this series of Lectures is, that this
very story, in all its length and breadth,
stands written upon the stars, put there in

32 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

the original framing of astronomy as an ever-
lasting witness of God's gracious purposes
toward our race, and that the heavens do
verily declare the highest glory of God.

How the Stars are Made to Speak.
To those who have never looked into the
science of astronomy, its truths, predictions,
and revelations necessarily appear very mys-
terious and surprising. Looking out upon
the multitude of stars that shine in the noc-
turnal heavens, they seem to be so scattered,
so entirely without order, so confusedly spread
over the face of the sky, that the untutored
mind may well despair of reading anything
intelligible there. And when, by the aid of
the telescope, thousands are multiplied to mil-
lions, and suns, systems, and universes rise to
view, and the eye sweeps outward to distances
which no figures of our arithmetic can express,
and into unfathomable gulfs of space all filled
up with an endless profusion of innumerable
worlds, any understanding of them, especially
the deciphering of great evangelic truths from
them, would seem to be the height of impos-
sibility. And if now, for the first time, man
had to grapple with the problem, with nothing
going before to assist him, vain indeed would

STAR-GROUPS. 33

be our poor short-lived efforts to master such
a tremendous field.

But we have not now for the first time, or
with only our weak and unaided powers, to
make the commencement of this study. Men
who lived almost a thousand years — men with
powers of vision that lasted undimmed through
nearly a decade of centuries — men with minds
in much closer communion than ours with the
infinite and eternal Intelligence — have em-
ployed themselves, helped as they were by
the great Maker's Spirit, in observing, classi-
fying, grouping, and designating these starry
worlds, assigning them their names, marking
their courses, and making them the bearers
of wisdom the dearest and most precious ever
made known to man. In their hands and to
their peering scrutiny this wilderness of stellar
glories took order, shape, and readable mean-
ing which the depravities of the after ages
have not been able to set aside, and which,
by the scientific enlightenment of our times,
we may retrace, and bring our minds into
communion with their own.

Star-Groups.
Any one attentively observing the starry
heavens will see that some of the stars are

34 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

brighter than others, " for one star cliffereth
from another star in glory." Some hold their
places from age to age with variations so
slight as scarcely to be observable in thou-
sands of years. Some of them are " wander-
ing stars," changing places continually, going
and returning at fixed intervals. Some of
them are nestled together in particular groups,
or stand alone in their special glories so as to
be easily distinguished. By means of these
facts maps of the heavens can be made as
well as maps of the earth ; and by the long
and careful observation and study of them it
has come to be known how these heavenly
configurations stood and will stand at any
particular period of time.

The starry heavens, therefore, are not mere
unmeaning and incomprehensible show — not
a boundless and trackless wilderness of lu-
minous orbs. There are paths which we can
thread, sometimes dark and rugged, and often
leading into depths through which it is hard
to follow them, but still not untraceable. As
men can find a way through the most intricate
musical composition, through a great poem,
through a sublime oration, and through the
plans and ideas of the most complicated spe-
cimen of mechanism or architecture, so may

STAR-GROUPS. 35

we find our way through the starry heavens,
and mostly tell where we are, what we are
contemplating, what relation part bears to part,
and read from these glorious luminaries as we
would read from the face of a clock or from
the placements of the letters of the alphabet.
And as most of these star-groups retain al-
most precisely the same places and relations
for thousands on thousands of years, if any one
cognizant of the facts, and setting himself for
the first time to describe them, had wished to
record certain great ideas for unchanged per-
petuation to the most distant ages, among all
the objects of Nature he could have selected
none so appropriate to his purpose or so per-
manently enduring as these stellar groups and
configurations. Naming them, and connect-
ing them with certain symbols of the ideas he
wished to convey, and transmitting and ex-
plaining to his posterity those names and fig-
ures thus conjoined with the stars, he would
link with his astronomy a whole system of
thoughts and hopes as clear as the stars them-
selves, and utterly imperishable as long as
that astronomy should remain in the know-
ledge of men.

And this, as I hope to make manifest, is
exactly what has been done.

36 the gospel in the stars.

Figures of the Star-Groups.
Somewhere in the earliest ages of human
existence the stars were named and arranged
into groups by some one thoroughly familiar
with the great facts of astronomy. Those
names and groupings were at the same time
included in certain figures, natural or imagi-
nary, but intensely symbolic and significant.
These names and figures have thence been
perpetuated in all the astronomic records of
all the ages and nations since. They are
founded on indisputable astronomic truth, and
hence form the groundwork of all maps and
designations of the celestial presentations.
They are in all the planispheres, celestial
globes, and star-charts among all people, from
one end of the earth to the other. Astrono-
mers growl at them, consider them arbitrary
and unnatural, and sometimes denounce them
as cumbrous, puerile, and confusing, but have
never been able to brush them off, or to substi-
tute anything better or more convenient in their
place. They are part of the common and uni-
versal language of astronomical science. They
have place and representation in all the alma-
nacs of all enlightened peoples. They are in all
the books and records devoted to descriptions

FIGURES OF THE STAR-GROUPS. S7

of the heavens. Faith and skepticism, piety
and irreligion, alike adopt and use them.
Revelation and pagan superstition both recog-
nize them. Heathen, Mohammedans, and Chris-
tians, the oldest with the latest, disagreeing
in so many things, yet agree in adopting and
honoring these primitive notations of the
stars. Even those who have the most fault
to find with them still employ them, and can-
not get on without them. And in and from
these the showing is, that all the great doc-
trines of the Christian faith were known, be-
lieved, cherished, and recorded from the ear-
liest generations of our race, proving that
God has spoken to man, and verily given
him a revelation of truths and hopes precise-
ly as written in our Scriptures, and so fondly
cherished by all Christian believers.

The announcement may sound strange, and
the undertaking to trace it may be deemed
adventurous and fanciful ; but if those who
hear me will go with me into the investiga-
tion, and look at and weigh the facts, I am
sure that we shall come out of the study all
the more satisfied with the certainty of our
Christian hopes, and all the more filled with
admiration of the goodness and wisdom of

o

the eternal Creator of all things.

38 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

I ask no preliminary scientific knowledge
of astronomy in order to follow what I have
to say, as that will not be needed. If a star-
map, celestial chart, or globe of the heavens
were consulted to familiarize the mind with
the figures denoting the principal constella-
tions, it would aid in appreciating the discus-
sion ; but if my hearers will favor me with
their attention, and follow me with their sym-
pathetic and earnest interest, it will be enough
to secure a reasonable impression of the sub-
ject, and to enable them to see and judge of
these star-pictures, whether they do not grand-
ly set forth great religious truths, past, pres-
ent, and to come.*

* Such a chart or map of the heavens, giving the original forty-
eight figures, and their relative locations and principal stars, has been
prepared to accompany this work ; but it may prove more satisfactory
to consult the usual charts or planispheres prepared for astronomic
studies. In the absence of facilities for consulting the common appa-
ratus for learning astronomy, the reader will be much helped by re-
ferring carefully to the chart here given as allusion is made to the
particular constellations in the course of the discussion.

ILccture g>ccontr.

THE SACRED CONSTELLATIONS.

Job 26 : 13 : "By His Spirit He hath garnished the heavens ; His
hand hath formed the crooked Serpent."

THE Gospel story, as written on the stars,
like much of the sacred Scriptures, is
pictorial. The record is accompanied with
important explanatory materials, but the chief
substance is given in pictures.

The Constellations.

Every atlas of the heavens is filled up with
figures and outlines of men, women, animals,
monsters, and other objects, each including a
certain set of stars. These stars, as thus des-
ignated and embraced, constitute so many
separate clusters or groups called the Con-
stellations, and these asterisms or constella-
tions cover all the principal stars visible to
the naked eye.

In the primeval astronomy the number of
these figures or star-groups was forty-eight.
In imitation of them, dozens more have been

39

40 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

added, mostly by modern philosophers. Among
these additions are the Sextant, the Giraffe,
the Fox and Goose, the Horned Horse, the
Fly, the Greyhounds, the Lynx, the Bird of
Paradise, Noah's Dove, the Clock, the Sculp-
tor's Workshop, the Painter's Easel, the Air-
Pump, Sobieski's Shield, the Brandenburg
Sceptre, and such like ; which may serve to
designate the groups of inferior stars to which
they have been assigned, but which are other-
wise totally meaningless, and utterly unworthy
of the associations into which they have been
thrust. Havino- no connection whatever with
the primitive constellations, except as poor and
impertinent imitations, they must of course
be thrown out and cast quite aside from the
inquiry now in hand. They are no part of
the original writing upon the stars, as pro-
posed for our present reading.

The primary and chief series of the old
forty-eight constellations is formed on the
line which the Sun seems to mark in the prog-
ress of the year, called the Ecliptic. That
line is really the path of the earth around the
Sun, in the course of which the Sun seems to
move thirty degrees every month, and at the
end of the twelfth month appears again where
it started at the beeinnincr 0f tne fjrst month.

THE ZODIAC. 41

The moon and planets follow apparently much
the same path, and are always seen within
eight or nine degrees of the line of the Sun's
course. We thus have a Nature-indicated
belt, about sixteen degrees wide, extending
around the entire circuit of the heavens, half
the year north and half the year south of the
equator of the earth extended into the sky.

The Zodiac.
Whilst the sun is thus making its annual
course from west to east through the centre
of this belt or zone, the moon makes twelve
complete revolutions around the earth, sug-
gesting the division of this belt into twelve
parts, or sections, of thirty degrees each ; for
twelve times thirty degrees complete the cir-
cle. We thus note twelve equal steps or
stages in the Sun's path as it makes its an-
nual circuit through the heavens. And this
belt or zone, with these twelve moons or
months for its steps or stages, is called the
Zodiac, from the primitive root zoad, a walk,
way, or going by steps, like Jacob's ladder.

The Twelve Signs.
So, again, each of these steps, stages, or
sections includes a certain number of fixed

4*

42 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

stars, making up a group or constellation,
which has its own particular figure, picture,
or " sio-n " to designate it, and after which it
is called. Hence the Twelve Signs of the
Zodiac, which are given in all the regular al-
manacs, and to which people have generally
had much regard in timing their industries
and undertakings. These signs are :

I. Virgo, the Virgin : the figure of a young
woman lying prostrate, with an ear of wheat
in one hand and a branch in the other.

II. Libra, the Scales : the figure of a pair
of balances, with one end of the beam up and
the other down, as in the act of weighing. In
some of the old planispheres a hand, or a wo-
man, appears holding the scales.

III. Scorpio, the Scorpion : the figure of a
gigantic, noxious, and deadly insect, with its
tail and sting uplifted in anger, as if striking.

IV. Sagittarius, the Bowman : the figure
of a horse with the body, arms, and head of a
man— a centaur — with a drawn bow and ar-
row pointed at the Scorpion.

V. Capricornus, the Goat: the figure of a
goat sinking down as in death, with the hinder
part of its body terminating in the vigorous
tail of a fish.

VI. Aquarius, the Waterman : the figure

THE TWELVE SIGNS. 43

of a man with a large urn, the contents of
which he is in the act of pouring out in a
great stream from the sky.

VII. Pisces, the Fishes : the figures of two
large fishes in the act of swimming, one to
the northward, the other with the ecliptic.

VIII. Aries, the Ram, by some nations
called the Lamb : the figure of a strong sheep,
with powerful curved horns, lying down in
easy composure, and looking out in conscious
strength over the field around it.

IX. Taurus, the Bull : the figure of the
shoulders, neck, head, horns, and front feet
of a powerful bull, in the attitude of rushing
and pushing forward with great energy.

X. Gemini, the Twins, or a man and woman
sometimes called Adam and Eve : usually,
two human figures closely united, and seated
together in endeared affection. In some of
the older representations the figure of this
constellation consists of two goats, or kids.

XI. Cancer, the Crab : the figure of a crab,
in the act of taking and holding on with its
strong pincer claws. In Egyptian astronomy
the scarabseus beetle, grasping and holding
on to the ball in which its eggs are deposited,
takes the place of the crab.

XII. Leo, the Lion : the figure of a great

44 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

rampant lion, leaping forth to rend, with his
feet over the writhing body of Hydra, the
Serpent, which is in the act of fleeing.

These twelve cardinal signs cover a large
part of the visible heavens, and extend en-
tirely around the earth, making and marking
the Solar Zodiac.

The Mansions of the Moon.
But ancient astronomy gives a further sub-
division of these twelve signs into twenty-
eight, called the Mansions of the Moon, or the
Lunar Zodiac. The moon makes its revolu-
tion around the earth in about twenty-eight
days, and so suggests the division of its course
through the heavens into twenty-eight sec-
tions, or steps, one for each day. Two and a
third of these sections or Mansions are em-
braced in each sign of the Solar Zodiac, and
each mansion is marked with its own partic-
ular name and smaller group of stars. Some
Oriental nations also had particular and sepa-
rate sets of figures for the designation of these
Lunar Mansions, though not uniformly the
same. It is rather from the names of these
Mansions, and of the stars in them, than from
the figures connected with them, that the sig-
nifications are to be learned, the main theme

THE DECANS. 45

being most commandingly given in the twelve
cardinal signs of which they are parts.

The Thirty-six Decans.

But these twelve great signs do not stand
alone. Each one of them has conjoined with
it, either on the north or south side of the Zo-
diacal belt, three other conspicuous constella-
tions, called Decans, from the Shemitic dek, a
"part" or "piece."

Albumazer — sometimes called Abu Masher
— a great Arab physician and astronomer who
lived about a thousand years ago, and whose
minute and learned writings on the subject
have been commented on by Aben Ezra as
of the highest authority, refers to " the Decans
and their houses according to the Persians,
Babylonians, and Egyptians," and says : " Here
follow the Decans, which the Arabs in their
language call faces. They are three to each
sign of the Way!' He says that the Indians
also had these Decans to each sign. And
Aben Ezra says : " According to Albumazer,
none of these forms from their first invention
have varied in coming down to us, nor one of
their words [names] changed, not a point
added or removed." Southey (in The Doctor,
vol. iii. p. 115) remarks that " in Egypt every

46 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

month was supposed to be under the care of
three Decerns, or directors, for the import
of the word must be found in the neighbor-
ing language of the Hebrews and Syrians.*
There were thirty-six of these, each superin-
tending ten days ; and these Decans were be-
lieved to exercise the most extensive influ-
ence. Astrological squares calculated upon
this mythology are still in existence." These
Decans can, for the most part, be distin-
guished by the fact that those belonging to
any one particular sign come upon the merid-
ian, or close along the meridian-line, at the
same time with the sign to which they belong.
Originally, they perhaps were all on the me-
ridian along with the signs to which they per-
tain.

Albumazer's enumeration of them is fully
credited by the Jewish Aben Ezra, himself a
learned astronomer, Orientalist, and scholar,
who wrote a commentary on Albumazer's
work. And after the closest scrutiny, those
who have most thoroughly examined and mas-
tered the subject in its various relations entire-

* This word is evidently from the Noetic or Shemitic Decah, to break.
Hence Decan, a " piece," a " division." Thus we have dek in Dan.
2:45, to denote a fragment or piece. And thus we still have in
English the word deck, to denote a part of a ship — the face of a ship,
as the Arabs also called these Decans faces.

THE DECANS. 47

ly agree with the same enumeration, which I
therefore accept and adopt for the present
inquiries into this starry lore, sure that the
particular examination of each sign, with the
Decans thus assigned to it, will furnish ample
internal proof that this enumeration is cor-
rect according to the original intention.

I. The Decans of Virgo.

i. Coma, the Infant, the Branch, the De-
sired One (erroneously, Berenice s Hair) ;

2. Centauries, a centaur, with dart piercing
a victim ;

3. Bootes, or Arcturus, the great Shepherd
and Harvester, holding a rod and sickle, and
walking forth before his flocks (erroneously
called Bears).

II. The Decans of Libra.

1. The Cross, over which Centaur is ad-
vancing, called the Southern Cross ;

2. Victim of Centaur, slain, pierced to death ;

3. The Crozvn, which the Serpent aims to
take, called the Northern Crown.

III. The Decans of Scorpio.

1. The Serpent, struggling with Ophiuchus;

2. Ophiuchus, wrestling with the Serpent,

4 8 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

stung in one heel by the Scorpion, and crush-
ing it with the other ;

3. Hercules, wounded in his heel, the other
foot over the Dragon's head, holding in one
hand the Golden Apples and the three-headed
Dog of hell, and in the other the uplifted club.

IV. The Decans of Sagittarius.

1. Lyra, an Eagle holding the Lyre, as in
triumphanfgladness ;

2. Ara, the Altar, with consuming fires,
burning downward;

3. Draco, the Dragon, the old Serpent,
winding himself about the Pole in horrid links
and contortions.

V. The Decans of Capricornus.

1. Sagitta, the Arrow, or killing dart sent
forth, the naked shaft of death ;

2. Aquila, the Eagle, pierced and falling ;

3. Delphinus, the Dolphin, springing up,
raised out of the sea.

VI. The Decans of Aquarius.
: . The Southern Fish, drinking in the strea m ;

2. Pegasus, a white horse, winged and speed-
ing, as with good tidings ;

3. Cygnus, the Swan on the wing, going
and returning, bearing the sign of the cross.

THE BE CANS. 49

VII. The Decans of Pisces.

i. The Band, holding up the Fishes, and
held by the Lamb, its doubled end fast to the
neck of Cetus, the Sea-Monster ;

2. Cepheus, a crowned king, holding a band
and sceptre, with his foot planted on the pole-
star as the great Victor and Lord ;

3. Andromeda, a woman in chains, and
threatened by the serpents of Medusa's head.

VIII. The Decans of Aries.

1. Cassiopeia, the woman enthroned;

2. Cetus, the Sea -Monster, closely and
strongly bound by the Lamb ;

3. Perseus, an armed and mighty man with
winged feet, who is carrying away in triumph
the cut-off head of a monster full of writhing
serpents, and holding aloft a great sword in
his rigfht hand.

IX. The Decans of Taurus.

1. Orion, a glorious Prince, with a sword
girded on his side, and his foot on the head
of the Hare or Serpent ;

2. Eridanus, the tortuous River, accounted
as belonging- to Orion ;

3. Auriga, the Wagoner, rather the Shep*

50 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

herd, carrying a she-goat and two little goats
on his left arm, and holding cords or bands
in his right hand.

X. The Decans of Gemini.
i. Lepns, the Hare, in some nations a ser-
pent, the mad enemy under Orion's feet ;

2. Cams Major, Sirius, the Great Dog, the
Prince coming;

3. Cams Minor % Procyon, the Second Dog,
following after Sirius and Orion.

XI. The Decans of Cancer.

1 . Ursa Minor, anciently the Lesser Sheep-
fold, close to and including the Pole ;

2. Ursa Major, anciently the Greater Sheep-
fold, in connection with Arcturus, the guardian
and keeper of the flock ;

3. Argo, the Ship, the company of trav-
ellers under the bright Canopus, their Prince,
the Argonauts returned with the Golden
Fleece.

XII. The Decans of Leo.

1. Hydra, the fleeing Serpent, trodden un-
der foot by the Crab and Lion ;

?. Crater, the Cup or Bowl of Wrath on
the Serpent ;

THE PLANETS. 5 I

3. Corvus, the Raven or Crow, the bird of
doom, tearing the Serpent.

This ends up the main story. And the
mere naming of these significant pictures
casts a light over the intelligent Christian
mind, which makes it feel at once that it is
in the midst of the most precious symbols
and ideas connected with our faith, as they
are everywhere set out in the Holy Scrip-
tures.

The Planets.
A further and very conspicuous marking
among the heavenly bodies appears in the
difference between the fixed stars and those
more brilliant orbs which are continually
changing their places. In reality, none of the
stars are absolutely fixed. Nearly all of them
have been observed to be in motion, shifting
their relative places, but moving so very
slowly that the changes are quite impercep-
tible except when hundreds of years are
taken into the observation. But it is very
different with some four, five, or more of the
most brilliant of the heavenly luminaries.
Though seeming to go around the earth like
all the other stars, their behavior is eccentric,
and their periods and motions are uneven.

52 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Two of them make their rounds in less than
a year, and three others take two, twelve, and
thirty years. They do not keep at the same
distances from each other, nor their places
among the more fixed stars. They are called
Planets, or Wanderers. The names of these
five old planets, as known to our astronomy,
are, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Sat-
urn. There are other planets, but they are
not recognizable to the naked eye. And to
these five wanderers, hence called planets,
the ancients added the Sun and Moon, mak-
ing the seven most renowned of all the celes-
tial bodies. The path of each of them lies
within the limits of the Zodiacal belt or zone ;
and the Twelve Signs of the Zodiac them-
selves were mostly regarded as the Twelve
Mansions of these conspicuous travellers,
which the old idolaters glorified as the seven
great gods.

The Constellations Divine.
In these several markings, groupings, and
designations of the heavenly hosts we have
all the most conspicuous elements and nota-
tions of the primeval astronomy. And these
pre-eminently are what the text refers to as
the garnish of the heavens, of which " the

THE CONSTELLATIONS DIVINE. 53

crooked," or rather "fleeing, Serpent " is here
named as a specific part.

There are but three things with which to
identify this " fleeing Serpent." It has been
justly said, " It is not likely that this inspired
writer should in an instant descend from the
garnishing of the heavens to the formation
of a reptile." The discourse is of the starry
heavens, and " the Serpent " must necessarily
pertain to the heavens. Barnes says : " There
can be no doubt that Job refers here to the
constellations," and that " the sense in the pas-
sage is, that the greatness and glory of God
are seen by forming the beautiful and glorious
constellations that adorn the sky." But if the
reference is to a sky-serpent, it must be either
the Zodiac itself, often painted on the ancient
spheres in the form of a serpent bent into a
circle, with its tail in its mouth, or to Draco,
or to Hydra, which is the longest figure in
the sky, stretching through an entire night,
and trailing along as if in flight from the point
of the Scales, beneath the Virgin and the Lion,
to the point where the feet of the Crab and
the Lion press down its snaky head. All
things duly considered, I take it as referring
to Hydra, just as Leviathan (in Job 41 : 1)
refers to Cetus. the Sea-monster. The Drae-

6 *

54 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

on does not so well answer to the description
of "the fleeing Serpent" nor yet the sphere in
the figure of a serpent. Hydra is in every
respect " tJie fleeing Serpent" as distinguished
from all other astronomic serpents. It does
nothing but flee. It flees from the triumph-
ing Lion, with the Bowl of Wrath on it and
the bird of doom tearing it, whilst the holders
of the precious possession trample its head
beneath their feet. But, in either case, there
is here a distinct recognition of the constella-
tions and their figures, and the same noted as
the particular garnishing of the heavens to
which we are referred to see and read the
transcendent glory of Jehovah.

Who Job was we do not precisely know.
That he lived before the Hebrew Exodus, be-
fore the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah,
and hence before Abraham, is evidenced from
the character, style, contents, and non-con-
tents of his sublime book, which is at once the
oldest, broadest, most original, most scientific
in all the Bible. From repeated astronomical
allusions contained in this book, with which
uninformed translators have had much trouble
and done some very unworthy work, different
mathematicians have calculated that Job lived
and wrote somewhere about twenty-one hun-

THE CONSTELLATIONS DLVINE. 55

dred and fifty years before Christ, which car-
ries us back more than one thousand years
before Homer and the Greeks, and a millen-
nium and a half before Thales, the first of the
Greek philosophers. And yet, already in the
time of Job the heavens were astronomically
laid out and arranged in the manner just de-
scribed, with the Zodiac formed, the constella-
tions named, the figures of them drawn and
recorded, and the same accepted and- cele-
brated by God's people as the particular
adornment of the sky in which to read the
Almighty's glory.

Very significant also is this word, "garnish-
ed" here employed by our translators. Its
main sense is that of ornament, decoration,
something1 added for embellishment ; but it has
the further meaning of summons and warning.

o o

And by these adornings God hath summoned
the heavens and filled them with proclama-
tions and warnings of His great purposes.
Perhaps it would be hard to find another
word to fit so truly to the facts or to the
original for which it stands. It falls in pre-
cisely with the whole idea of the celestial
luminaries being used " for signs," of the
Gospel being written in the stars, and of the
adornment and beaming; of the heavens with

56 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

this brightness 0f all sacred brightnesses.
And when we come to the direct analysis of
these frescoes on the sky, as I propose in my
next Lecture, we will find the diction of the
Bible from end to end most thoroughly con-
formed to these beautiful constellations.

But more remarkable and important is the
positive testimony here given to the divine
origin of these embellishments and significant
frescoes. All interpreters agree that the text
refers to the heavenly constellations. This
is made the more certain by the designation
of the Serpent in the second part of the par-
allelism. That " fleeing Serpent" must mean
either Draco, the Zodiac, or Hydra. And the
affirmation is clear and pointed that the thing
referred to is divine in its formation. Of the
Almighty and His wisdom and power Job is
speaking ; and of that Almighty it is declared,
<( By His Spirit He hath garnished the heav-
ens," and " His hand formed the fleeing Ser-
pent." If the frescoing of the sky with the
constellations is meant, then He caused it to
be done "by His Spirit" — by impulse and in-
spiration from His own almightiness. If the
Zodiac is meant, then His own hand bent and
formed it. And if the constellation of the
Dragon, or Hydra, is meant, then He himself

THE CONSTELLATIONS DIVINE. S7

is the Author of it, and, by implication, the
Author of the whole system of the constella-
tions of which Draco, or Hydra, is a part.*
We may wonder and stand amazed and con-
founded at the assertion ; but here, from the
Book of God, is the unalterable voucher for
it, that these astronomic figures, in their orig-
inal integrity and meaning, diY&from God, and
as truly inspired as the Bible itself. And
many are the facts which combine to prove
that such is verily the truth.

Who, of all the sons of men, can point out
any other origin of these remarkable denota-
tions of the starry heavens ? Who can tell
us when, where, or by whom else the Zodiac
was invented, its signs determined, and the
attendant constellations fixed? Historical as-
tronomy is totally at a loss to give us any
other information on the subject. Here is
the Solar Zoad, with its twelve signs and their
thirty-six Decans ; here is the Lunar Zoad,
with its twenty-eight Mansions, each with its
own particular stars, and each with its very
expressive name ; and here are the noted
seven Chiefs, playing a part in the traditions,
sciences, theologies, and superstitions of earth,
as brilliant as their splendid display on the
face of the sky ; but whence and how they

5 8 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

were framed into these systems or came tc
place so conspicuous, acceptation so uni-
versal, and life so commanding and imperish-
able, even the science which handles them
most is quite unable to explain. As seven
cities claimed to be the birthplace of Homer,
who most likely was born in neither, so men
in their uncertainty have referred to names
and widely different countries, times, and ages
for the source and authorship of the primeval
astronomy, with about equal reason for each,
and no solid reason for either. The world
has looked in vain for the orimn of these in-
ventions on this side of the Flood, or any-
where short of those inspired patriarchs and
prophets who illumined the first periods of
the race with their superior wisdom and ex-
alted piety.

Age of the Constellations.
One great and commanding fact in the case
is that, as far back as we have any records
of astronomy, these sidereal embellishments
and notations existed and are included. We
know from the Scriptures that they are older
than any one of the books which make up the
Christian and Jewish Bible. We have mon-
umental evidence in the Great Pyramid of

AGE OF THE CONSTELLATIONS. 59

Gizeh that they were known and noted when
that mighty science-structure was built, twenty-
one hundred and seventy years before the
birth of Christ and a thousand years before
Homer, who also refers to them. The learn-
ed Dr. Seyffarth, than whom there is not a
more competent witness living, affirms that
we have the most conclusive proofs that our
Zodiac goes back among the Romans as far
as seven hundred and fifty-two years before
Christ, amono- the Greeks seven hundred and
seventy-eight years before Christ, among the
Egyptians twenty-seven hundred and eighty-
one years before Christ, and among the Ori-
ental peoples as far as thirty-four hundred
and forty-seven years before Christ — even to
within the lifetime of Adam himself. Riccioli
affirms that it appears from the Arab astron-
omy that it is as old as Adam's time, and that
the names preserved by it are antediluvian.
Bailly and others have given it as their con-
clusion that astronomy must have had its be-
ginning when the summer solstice was in the
first degree of Virgo, and that the Solar and
Lunar Zodiacs are as old as that time, which
could only be about four thousand years be-
fore Christ. Professor Mitchell says : " We
delight to honor the names of Kepler, Gali-

60 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

leo, and Newton ; but we must go beyond the
epoch of the Deluge, and seek our first dis-
coveries among those sages whom God per-
mitted to count their age by centuries, and
there learn the order in which the secrets of
the starry world yielded themselves up."
According to Drummond, " Origen tells us
that it was asserted in the Book of Enoch
(quoted by the apostle Jude) that in the time
of that patriarch the constellations were al-
ready named and divided." Albumazer at-
tributes the invention of both Zodiacs to
Hermes ; and Hermes, according to the Arab
and Egyptian authorities, was the patriarch
Enoch. Josephus and the Jewish rabbis af-
firm that the "starry lore" had its origin with
the antediluvian patriarchs, Seth and Enoch.

The Sabbatic Week and the Stars.
It is generally claimed that the Sabbath, and
the week of seven days which it marks, date
back to the beginning of the race, to the insti-
tution of God himself at the completion of the
great creation-work. But that system of the
seven days is essentially bound up with these
selfsame astronomical notations. We find
among all the ancient nations— Chaldeans,
Persians, Hindoos, Chinese, and Egyptians

THE SABBATIC WEEK. 6 1

that the seven days of the week were in uni-
versal use ; and, what is far more remarkable,
each of these nations named the days of the
week, as we still do, after the seven planets,
numbering the Sun and Moon amono- them.
Hence we say £#«-day, Afoon-day, Tuisco or
Times' -day (Tuisco being the Anglo-Saxon
name for Mars), Woden s-ddcy (Woden being
the same as Mercury), Thor's-d&y (Thor being
the same as Jupiter), Friga-d&y (Friga or
Freiya being the same as Venus), and lastly,
Saturn-d&y> anciently the most sacred of the
seven. The order is not that of the distance,
velocity, or brilliancy of the orbs named, nei-
ther does the first day of the week always co-
incide among- the different nations ; but the
succession, no matter with which of the days
begun, is everywhere the same. It is impos-
sible to suppose this mere accident or chance ;
and the fact forces the conclusion that the de-
vising and naming of the seven days of the
week dates back to some primitive represen-
tatives of the race, from whom the tradition
has thus generally descended, and who at
the same time knew and had regard to the
seven planets as enumerated in the primeval
astronomy.

62 the gospel in the stars.

The Alphabet and the Stars.

It is now mostly admitted that alphabetic
writing1 is as old as the human family — that
Adam knew how to write as well as we, and
that he did write. There certainly were books
or writing's before the Flood, for the New

o

Testament quotes from one of them, which it
ascribes to Enoch, and Adam still lived more
than three hundred years after Enoch was
born. All the known primitive alphabets had
the same number of letters, including seven
vowels, and all began, as now, with A, B, C,
and ended with S, T, U. But whilst we are
using the alphabet every day in almost every-
thing, how few have ever thought to remark
why the letters appear in the one fixed order
of succession, and why the vowels are so ir-
regularly distributed among the consonants !
Yet in the simple every-day a, b, <f's we have
the evidence of the knowledge and actual rec-
ord of the seven planets in connection with
the Zodiac, dating back to the year 3447 be-
fore Christ. If we refer the twenty-five let-
ters of the primitive alphabet to the twelve
signs of the Zodiac, placing the first two let-
ters in Gemini as the first sign, and take the
seven vowels in their places as representing

THE ALPHABET AND THE STARS. 6$

the seven planets, a for the Moon, e for Ve-
nus, the two additional sounds of e* for the
Sun and Mercury, i for Mars, o for Jupiter,
and u for Saturn, as Sanchoniathon and vari-
ous of the ancients say they are to be taken,
the result is that we find the Moon in the first
half of Gemini, Venus in the first half of Leo,
the Sun in the latter half of Virgo, Mercury
in the first half of Libra, Mars in the latter
half of Scorpio, Jupiter in the latter half of
Aquarius, and Saturn in the first half of Gem-
ini ; which, according to Dr. Seyffarth, is an
exact notation of the actual condition of the
heavens at an ascertainable date, which can
occur but once in many thousands of years,
and that date is the seventh day of Septem-
ber, 3447 before Christ !

It would be very absurd to say that this
was mere accident. But, if it was not acci-
dent, it proves what the Arab and Jewish
writers affirm, that the alphabet was in exist-
ence before the Flood, and demonstrates that
astronomy is coeval with the formation of the
alphabet.

Other facts, equally striking, but rather
complex for ready popular statement, exist, to
some of which we may have occasion to refer,

* E and E, with place next to the Hebrew Chelh and the Latin k.

64 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

all going to show and prove that the notations
of the heavens so fully recorded in all antiquity
do unmistakably date back beyond the Flood ;
that they came into being by no long-forming
induction of man ; that the whole system ap
peared full and complete from the start, like
Pallas from the brain of Jove ; and that the
only true answer to the question of its origin
is the one given in the text, which unequivo-
cally ascribes it to the inspiration of God, who
by His Spirit garnished the heavens and with
His own hand bent the traditional ring of their
goings.

It thus appears that in treating of these
starry groupings and pictures we are dealing
with something very different from the inven-
tions of paganism and mythology — with some-
thing as sacred in origin, as venerable in age,
and as edifying in import as anything known
to man. Corrupt religion and classic fable
have interfered to obscure and pervert their
meaning, and scientific self-will has crowded
them with impertinent and unmeaning addi-
tions ; but, in reality, they constitute the prim-
eval Bible — a divine record of the true faith
and hope of man, the oldest in human pos-
session. With solemn and jealous venera-
tion does it become us to regard them, and

MORE THAN PAGANISM. 65

with devout earnestness to study them, that
we may get from them what God meant they
should be to His children upon the earth, —
sure that what, by His Spirit, He caused to
be written on the sky is of one piece with
what, by the same Spirit, He has caused to
be written in His Word.

Field of glories ! spacious field,
And worthy of the Master : He whose hand
With hieroglyphics, elder than the Nile,
Inscribed the mystic tablet ; hung on high
To public gaze, and said, Adore, O man I
The finger of thy God.
d* B

lecture EJjtrtr.

THE DESIRE OE NATIONS.

Isa. 7:14: " Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, ana
snail call his name Immanuel."

THE learned George Stanley Faber, rec-
tor of Long-Newton, concedes to the
showings of certain French skeptics what has
often been noticed and remarked by the stu-
dents of antiquity, that an extraordinary and
very particular resemblance exists between
the facts and doctrines of the Christian faith
and the various theologies and mythologies
of ancient paganism.

The Ethnic Myths.
Gathering up and combining in one view
what appears in the various modifications of
ancient heathenism, we find it taught and be-
lieved, in one system or another, that eternal
Godhead, or some direct emanation of eternal
Godhead, was to become incarnate, to be born
of a virgin mother, to spend his infancy and
childhood among herds and flocks, whose life

66

AN INFIDEL ARGUMENT. 6?

should be sought by a huge serpent or dragon,
which was even to slay him, but which he was
destined to conquer and crush ; that he came,
or was to come, from heaven for the purpose
of reforming and delivering mankind ; that
he was mild, contemplative, and good, but
still the god of vengeance, with power to
destroy his enemies ; that he was a priest, a
prophet, and a king, the sacrificer of himself,
and the parent, husband, and son of the great
Mother, denoted often by a floating ark ; that
he was the creator of worlds and aeons, previ-
ous to which he moved on boundless waters ;
that when slain he was entombed, descended
into the hidden world, but rose to life again,
ascended the top of a lofty mountain, and
thence was translated to heaven.

The likeness of these particulars to the
scriptural teachings concerning Christ is ob-
vious. How to account for them among
heathen peoples who never possessed our
Scriptures, and lived before our Scriptures
were written, is a very interesting and im-
portant question.

An Infidel Argument.
That the correspondence is not accidental
must be admitted. Volney has attempted to

68 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

draw an argument from it to prove that Christ
never existed, and is only a mythic character,
embodying the various old fancies afloat in
the imaginations of mankind long before the
time in which the Gospel records allege that
He was born. The argument is, that, of the
two presentations, one must necessarily be
borrowed from the other ; that the old myths
could not be borrowed from Christianity, as
they antedate the Christian times ; and hence
that Christianity must needs be borrowed
from these old myths and traditions, which it
has arrayed in a Jewish dress and palmed
upon the world for the founding of a new re-
ligious sect.

But this alleged borrowing and accommo
dation is mere assumption, incapable of proof.
Faber has shown that the antediluvian histo-
ries, including particularly that of Noah, fur-
nished so many types of Christian facts that
from them alone could have been deduced
many of the ideas in the ethnic theologies
which so remarkably accord with the doc-
trines of Christianity. Volney himself, and
others of his school, with much labor and eru-
dition have further shown that there is an as-
tronomic record, dating back to the times of
Noah and beyond, which really gives the

AN INFIDEL ARGUMENT. 69

story of the incarnation and history of Christ,
just as Christianity attests. It accordingly
devolves upon these men adequately to ac-
count for that record before they can justly
use it against Christianity. To account for
Christianity by means of that record, which
they rightfully claim to be universal, a.\d yet
to leave that record itself unaccounted for, is
really a mere begging of the question.

From the nature of the showings on the
subject we claim that the substance of that
record must needs have been a matter of di-
vine revelation, a thing of inspiration, fixed
in the earliest ages of the race. If we are
right in this, it would fully account for all the
old fables, notions, myths, and ideas so near
akin to Christianity, and at the same time do
away with all need, occasion, or right to infer
that it must have been borrowed and accom-
modated from them. Tracing this record back
to the first ages, as these men do, and finding
in it the story of the Serpent and the Cross
as contained in the Gospel, we thus have a
demonstration of the early existence of what
the Bible gives as a divine promise and proph-
ecy, and the same dating from the time to
which the Bible assigns it. That story, thus
embodied and set afloat from the beginning,

7<D THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

would necessarily descend with the multipli-
cation and division of the race into all nations,
and give rise and support to just such sacred
myths and anticipations as we find confusedly
given in the traditions and beliefs of all the
ancient peoples. The strong presumption,
therefore, the rather is, that Christianity, in-
stead of having been borrowed and accommo-
dated from those myths, was in contempla-
tion in that which gave rise to them, and was
the real spring of them, as it is the fulfilment
and realization of them.

The Intention Traceable.

Of course this record has been much dis-
torted, perverted, misused, and overlaid by
the superstitions, apostasies, and idolatries of
men ; but the showings of Bailly, Dupuis, Vol-
ney, and more modern antiquarians are that
it can still be traced, and its main features
unmistakably identified.

Some years ago I was in the great church
of St. Sophia in Constantinople, built by the
first Christian emperor, but now possessed
by the Mohammedan Turks. Among the
rest of its wonderful mosaics is a oq^antic
figure of the Saviour on the wall over the
altar-place. That picture was of course very

THE SIGN OF VIRGO. 71

distasteful to the followers of the false Proph-
et of Arabia ; but, not willing to spoil the
glorious edifice by digging it out of the wall,
they covered it over with whitewash and paint.
Nevertheless, in spite of all attempted oblit-
erations, the original picture still shone through
the covering, and could be distinctly perceived
and identified. And just so it is with these
mosaics upon the stars. With all the obscu-
rations which the ages of apostasy and hea-
thenism have imposed upon them, they still
shine through, to tell of the faith which put
them there, and to declare that very glory of
God which received its sublimest expression
in the imperishable truths of our Gospel.
Even astrology, Sabaism, the abominations
of idolatry, and skepticism itself, have been
overruled to preserve to us what God, by His
Spirit, thus caused to be recorded on the face
of the sky from the very beginning of the
world. And to the analysis and interpreta-
tion of this record we now come.

The Sign of Virgo.
I begin with Virgo, which I take to be the
first sign in the Zodiac, according to its orig-
inal intent and reading. The Zodiac of Esne
begins with this sign. The story has no right

72 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

starting-point, continuity, or end except as we
commence with this constellation. I also have
the statement from the best authorities that
the custom was universal among the ancients
to reckon from Virgo round to Leo. And in
this sign of Virgo, if anywhere among the
starry groups, we find the primary idea in the
evangelic presentations.

The foundation-doctrine of all religion —
the existence of an eternal and almighty
God, the Originator, Preserver, and great
Father of all things — is assumed as belong-
ing to the natural intuitions of a right man.
The presence of the universe is the invincible
demonstration of eternal power and Godhead,
so that those are without excuse who fail to see
that there is a God or do not glorify Him as
God. Revelation is something superadded to
Nature, which Nature itself cannot reach. As-
suming the majesty of God and the sinfulness
of man as things evident to natural reason
and observation, its main subject is the way
of salvation through Jesus Christ, the Gospel
of the grace of God through His only-be-
gotten Son. This is the one great theme of
the Bible and of the primeval astronomy.

As Christians, we believe in a virmn-born
Saviour. We confess and hold that our Lord

THE SIGN OF VIRGO. 73

Jesus Christ " was conceived by the Holy
Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary." So He
was preannounced in the text, and so the
evangelists testify of the facts concerning Him.
To deny this is to deny the fundamental fea-
tures of the whole Christian system and to
disable the whole doctrine of human salva-
tion. It stands in the front of all the Gospel
presentations. It is the foundation and be-
ginning of the whole structure on which our
redemption hangs.

It is therefore not a little striking- that the
very first sign which comes before us as we
enter the grand gallery of the ancient con-
stellations is the form and figure of a virgin.
The initiative sign of the Zodiac is called Vir-
go, the Virgin. All the traditions, names,
and mytholgies connected with it recognize
and emphasize the virginity of this woman.
Astrea* and Athene of Greek story identify

* Astrea was regarded as the star-bright, good, and just goddess,
the last to leave the earth as the Golden Age faded out, and then
took her place among the stars. The four ages of Gold, Silver, Brass,
and Iron were the periods of time in which the equinoctial point suc-
cessively passed through so many signs of the Zodiac, each sign re-
quiring about twenty-one hundred and forty-six years to pass. If the
summer solstice was in Virgo in the first or Golden Age, her with-
drawal over that point as the equinoxes proceeded would have been
very slow, and everything else characteristic of that age would have
passed away before she passed. The myth would hence well fit to
the astronomical facts. Since passing that point she has never re-
7

74 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

with her. In Hebrew and Syriac she is Bet ku-
lak, the maiden. In Arabic she is Adarah, the
pure virgin. In Greek she is Parthenos, the
maid of virgin pureness. Nor is there any
authority in the world for regarding her as
anything but a virgin.

The Virgin's Son.
But the greater wonder is, that motherhood
attends this virginity, in the sign the same as
in the text, and in the whole teaching of the
Scriptures respecting the maternity of our
Saviour. Krishna, the divine incarnation of
the Hindoo mythology, was born of a virgin.
A hundred years before Christ an altar was
found in Gaul with this inscription: "To the
virgin who is to bring for tk." And this maid-
en in the sign is the holder and bringer of an
illustrious Seed. In her hand is the spica, the
ear of wheat, the best of seed, and that spica
indicated by the brightest star in the whole
constellation. He who was to bruise the Ser-
pent's head was to be peculiarly " the Seed
of the woman," involving virgin-motherhood,
and hence one born of miracle, one begotten
of divine power, the Son of God. And such

turned to her former plaee, and cannot until about twenty-6ve, thou-
sand years from the time she left it.

THE VIRGIN'S SON 75

is the exhibit in this first sign of the zodiac.
She is a virgin, and yet she produces and
holds forth a Seed contemplated as far great-
er than herself. That seed of wheat Christ
appropriates as a symbol of himself. When
certain Greeks came to Philip wishing to see
Jesus, He referred to himself as the corn, or
seed, of wheat, which needed to fall and die
in order to its proper fruitfulness (John 1 2 :
21-24). Thus, according to the starry sign,
as according to the Gospel, out of the seed
of wheat, the good seed of the Virgin, the
blessed harvest of salvation comes.

A very significant figure of Christ, much
employed by the prophets, was the branch,
bough, or sprout of a plant or root. Hence
He is described as the Rod from the stem of
Jesse and the Branch out of his roots (Isa. 1 1 :
1), the Branch of Righteousness, the Branch
of the Lord, God's servant the Branch
(Isa. 4:2; Jer. 23 : 5 ; Zech. 3:8; 6:12).
And so this sign holds forth the Virgin's Seed
as The Branch. In addition to the spica in
one hand, she bears a branch in the other.
The ancient names of the stars in this con-
stellation emphasize this showing, along with
that of the Seed. Al Zimach, Al Azal, and
Subilon mean the shoot, the branch, the ear

7 6 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

of wheat. The language of the prophecies is
thus identical with the symbols in this sign.

It is a doctrine of our religion that without
Christ, and the redemption wrought by Him,
all humanity is fallen and helpless in sin.
There is none other name given among men
whereby we can be saved. Even Mary her-
self needed the mediatorial achievements of
her more glorious Son to lift her up to hope
and standing before God. And this, too, is
here signified. This woman of the Zodiac
lies prostrate. She is fallen, and cannot of
herself stand upright. Christ alone can lift
up to spiritual life and standing. This woman
accordingly holds forth the goodly Seed, the
illustrious Branch, as the great embodiment
of her hope and trust, the only adequate hope
and trust of prostrate and fallen humanity.

And what is thus vividly signified in this
constellation is still further expressed and de-
fined by the Decans, or side-pieces, which go
along- with it.

Coma.
Albumazer, who was not a Christian, says :
" There arises in the first Decan, as the Per-
sians, Chaldeans, and Egyptians, and the two
Hermes and Ascalius, teach, a young ivoman,

coma. 77

whose Persian name denotes a pure virgin,
sitting on a throne, nourishing an infant boy,
said boy having a Hebrew name, by some
nations call Ihesu, with the signification Ieza,
which in Greek is called Christ." The celebra-
ted Zodiac of Dendera, brought by the French
savants to Paris under the older Napoleon,
contains a Decan of Virgo, which also gives
the picture of a woman holding an infant,
which she is contemplating and admiring.
The woman in Virgo and the woman in this
first Decan of Virgo are one and the same ;
and the infant here is everywhere identified
with the Seed and the Branch there.

It is said of the infant Christ that " the child
grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with
wisdom, and the grace of God was upon him"
(Luke 2 : 40) ; so here He is pictured as sup-
ported and nourished by what the Greeks
made the virgin-goddess of wisdom, right-
eousness, and all good arts and human thrift.

The prophets are also very emphatic in de-
scribing the promised Saviour as the Desired
One, " the Desire of women," " the Desire of
all nations." So the name of this first Decan
of Virgo is Coma, which in Hebrew and Ori-
ental dialects means the desired, the longed-for
— the very word which Haggai uses where he

7 8 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

speaks of Christ as " the Desire of all nations/'
The ancient Egyptians called it S/ies-uu, the
desired son. The Greeks knew not how to
translate it, and hence took Coma in the sense
of their own language, and called it hair —
Berenice- s Hair. The story is, that that prin-
cess gave her hair, the color of gold, as a vo-
tive offering for the safety of her brother;
which hair disappeared. The matter was ex-
plained by the assurance that it was taken to
heaven to shine in the constellation of Coma.
Hence we have a bundle of woman's hair in
the place of " the Desire of all nations."

Shakespeare understood the matter better,
for he speaks of the shooting of an arrow up
" to the good boy in Virgo's lap." Isis and
other Egyptian goddesses figured holding the
divine Infant, the Coming One, refer to this
constellation of Coma, and hence unwittingly
to Christ, born of a woman and nurtured on a
virgin-mother's breast.

The next Decan of Virgo explains more
fully concerning the Virgin's Seed.

The Double Nature.
It is part of the faith, and a very vital part,
that the Seed of the woman is the true and
only-begotten Son of God, true God and true

THE DOUBLE NATURE. 79

man in one and the same person. " For the
right faith is, that we believe and confess that
our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is God
and man ; God, of the substance of the Father,
begotten before the worlds, and man, of the
substance of His mother, born in the world :
perfect God and perfect man." It is a great
mystery, but so the Scriptures teach, and so
the whole orthodox Church believes. In other
words, we teach and hold that Christ, our Sa-
viour, possessed a double nature, " not by con-
version of the Godhead into flesh, but by tak-
ing the manhood into God," in the unity of one
Person, who accordingly is Immamiel, God
with us, the Christ, who suffered for our sal-
vation. And all this is signified in the con-
stellation of Centaurus.

Very curious are the pagan myths concern-
ing the centaurs. Fable represents them as
the great bull-killers. They are said to have
been heaven-begotten, born of the clouds,
sons of God, but hated and abhorred by both
gods and men, combated, driven to the moun-
tains, and finally exterminated. Their form
in the most ancient art is a composite of man
and horse — man from the head down to the
front feet, and the rest horse. There was no
beauty or comeliness, that any should desire

SO THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

them. Some classical scholars have tried to
account for the grotesque conception by im-
agining a race of Thessalian mountaineers who
rode on horses, whom the neighboring tribes
viewed with horror, supposing each horse and
his rider to be one being. The conceit is with-
out the slighest foundation in fact. The an-
cient Egyptians had the figure of the centaur
lone before the times of the Greeks.

The most noted of the centaurs of classic
fable is Cheiron. To him are ascribed great
wisdom and righteousness. " He was re-
nowned for his skill in hunting, medicine,
music, gymnastics, and the art of prophecy.
All the most distinguished heroes in Grecian
story are, like Achilles, described as his pu-
pils in these arts." He was the friend of the
Argonauts on their voyage, and the friend of
Hercules, though he died from one of the
poisoned arrows of this divine hero whilst
engaged in a struggle with the Erymanthean
boar. He was immortal, but he voluntarily
aoreed to die, and transferred his immortality
to Prometheus ; whereupon the great God took
him up and placed him among the stars.

It is easy to see how this whole idea of the
centaurs, particularly of Cheiron, connects
with the primeval astronomy and related tra-

THE DOUBLE NATURE. 8 1

ditions. Strikingly also does it set forth the
nature and earthly career of the divine Seed
of the woman, as narrated in the Scriptures.
Christ had two natures in one person ; and
such was the figure of the centaur. Christ
was a wise, just, good, and powerful Healer,
Instructor, and Prophet ; and such is the cha-
racter everywhere ascribed to the chief cen-
taur. Christ came to destroy the works of
the Devil, and spent His energies in reliev-
ing men's ills, combating the powers of evil,
teaching the ways of truth and righteousness,
and driving away afflictions, as the centaurs
hunted and destroyed the wild bulls and the
wild boars, and as Cheiron helped and taught
the Grecian heroes, minstrels, and sages.
Nevertheless, He was despised and rejected
of men, hated, persecuted, and deemed unfit
to live, just as fabled of the centaurs. Chei-
ron was fatally wrounded whilst engaged in
his good work — wounded by a poisoned arrow
from heaven not intended for him. And,
though immortal in himself, he chose to die
from that wound, that another might live.
And so it was with Christ in His conflict with
the Destroyer. And a vivid picture of the
same appears in the figure of this constella-
tion, which is also one of the very lowest and

F

S2 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

farthest down of all the signs belonging to the
ancient astronomy.

Here is a double-natured beino-, to men
repulsive and hateful, yet really great, pow-
erful, and beneficent, pushing with his lance
at the heart of some victim, and moving the
while right over the constellation of the Cross.

The name of this Decan in Arabic and
Hebrew means the despised. The brightest
star in it the Greeks called Cheiron, a word
which has a Hebrew root signifying" the
pierced ; also Pho/as, likewise from a Hebrew
root signifying the making of prayer, the
mediation. Sir John Herschel has observed
that this star is growing brighter, and so be-
longs to the class of changeable stars. Ulu°di
Beigh gives its name as Tollman, which means
the heretofore and the hereafter — brighter once,
and to be brighter again, as the divine glory
of Christ was much hidden during His earthly
life, in which He made himself of no reputa-
tion, even lower than the angels, for the suf-
fering of death, but was again glorified with
the glory which He had with the Father be-
fore the world was. Thus, this sign, and the
traditions and names connected with it, strik-
ingly accord with the facts of Christ's earthly
life and fate, and set forth some of the high-

BOOTES. 8$

est mysteries of His Person, character, and
mediatorial work.

Bootes.

The third Decan of this sign still further
expresses and defines the marvellous story.

One of the most common, constant, and
expressive figures under which Christ is pre-
sented in the Scriptures is that of the Ori-
ental shepherd. Isaiah fore-announced Him
as He who " shall feed His flock like a shep-
herd." Peter describes Him as the Shepherd
and Bishop of our souls. He says of himself,
" I am the good Shepherd that giveth His life
for the sheep ;" " I am the good Shepherd,
and know my sheep, and am known of mine ;"
" My sheep hear my voice, and I know them,
and they follow me ; and I give unto them
eternal life ; and they shall never perish,
neither shall any man pluck them out of my
hand." And this feature of what pertains to
the Virgin's Son is the particular topic of this
Decan.

We here have the figure of a strong man,
whom the Greeks named Bootes, the plough-
man. But he and the so-called plough are
set in opposite directions. Neither does a
man plough with uplifted hand in the attitude

84 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

of this figure. The name thus transformed
into Greek has in it a Hebrew and Oriental
root, Bo, which means coming ; hence, the
coming- One or the One that was to come.
The Greeks, failing to hold on consistently to
their idea of a ploughman, also called this
man Arcturus, the watcher, guardian, or keep-
er of Arktos, the adjoining constellation, which
in all the more ancient representations is the
flock, the sheep/old. Bootes is not a plough-
man at all, but the guardian and shepherd
of the flocks represented by what are now or-
dinarily called the Great and Lesser Bears ;
though they both have long tails, which bears
never have. The brightest star in the con-
stellation of Bootes is also called Arcturus,
the guardian or keeper of Arktos, a word
which in its Oriental elements connects with
the idea of enclosure, the ascending, the
happy, the going up upon the mountains.
According to Ulugh Beigh, the ancient Egyp-
tians called Bootes Smat, who rules, subdues,
governs ; and sometimes Bait, or Bo, the
coming One. Al Katurops, the star on the
right side or arm of Bootes, means the Branch,
the Rod, and is often connected with the fig-
ure of a staff, the shepherd's crook, the tradi-
tional emblem of the pastoral office.

SUMMARY ON VIRGO. 85

There can, therefore, be no doubt that we
have here not a Greek ploughman, but the
far more ancient Oriental shepherd^ the keeper,
guardian, ruler, and protector of the flocks ;
and that shepherd identical with the Seed of
the Virgin, the Promised One, He who was
to come, even " the Desire of all nations,"
" that great Shepherd of the sheep " whom
the God of peace brought up again from the
dead (Heb 13 : 20). He also bears a sickle,
which shows Him as the ereat Harvester ;
and the harvest He gathers is the harvest of
souls, as where He directs his disciples to
pray God to send forth laborers into His har-
vest. And the harvesting of souls is the
gathering and keeping of the Lord's flock.
The sickle and the crook thus go together as
significant of one and the same idea, and
show that Bootes is not the keeper of dogs
and hunter of bears, but that promised Sa-
viour who was to come to gather in the har-
vest of souls and " feed His flock like a
shepherd."

Summary on Virgo.
It is no part of my design in these Lectures
to enter upon the exposition of all that is im-
plied and expressed in the various symbols

86 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

applied to Christ, except so far as necessary
to show that what is written in the Scriptures
is likewise written on the stars. And in so
far as this first sign and its Decans are con-
cerned, I think it must be admitted that the
result is very marvellous. Ill must be the
mind and dull the apprehension which cannot
detect identity between God's sign in the text
and this sign in the heavens. Are they not
of a piece with each other, and hence from
one and the same divine source ? Here is the
woman whose Seed was to bruise the Ser-
pent's head. Here is the great Virgin-born,
the divine Child, whose name is Wonderful,
Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting
Father, The Prince of Peace, of the increase
of whose government and peace there is to
be no end. Here is the prostrate one, de-
ceived by Satan into sin and condemnation,
but holding hopefully to the promised Seed,
the most illustrious in the sphere of humanity,
the vigorous, beautiful, and goodly Branch, as
the particular joy and consolation of fallen
man. Here is the Desire of all nations, the
great Coming One, reseating the fallen who
cherish and joy in Him. Here is His double
nature in singleness of person, the " God
with us" held forth in holy prophecy, the

SUMMARY ON VIRGO. 87

Seed of the woman, who is the Son of God.
Here is the Rod, the Branch, on whom was
to rest the Spirit of wisdom and understand-
ing, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit
of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord,
who should judge the poor with righteousness
and reprove with equity, and smite the earth
with the rod of His mouth, and slay the
wicked with the breath of His lips. Here is
the God-begotten Healer, Teacher, Prophet,
the heroic Destroyer of the destroyers, yet
despised and rejected of men, stricken, smit-
ten, and afflicted, consenting to yield up his
life that others might have immortality, and
thereupon reappearing on high, clad in power
and majesty, as the strong and everlasting
Ruler, Guardian, and Shepherd of his flocks.
These are among the most essential and
most precious things of our faith. The Gos-
pel is nothing without them. Yet this is but
one of twelve such signs, each equally full,
vivid, and to the point. God never does
things by halves. What He once begins He
always completes. We have seen the first of
these sioms. It bears with it the internal as
well as the external evidences of what Mai-
monides says the ancient Fathers affirmed, to
wit: that it has come from the Spirit of proph-

88 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ecy. And if God inspired the framing of these
signs, we may expect to find the rest as rich
and telling as this opening of the series, each
amplifying the other, till all the sublime won-
ders of redemption stand revealed upon the
sky.

Meanwhile, let us believe and hold fast to
the fact, so joyously fore-announced by the
prophet, and so vividly inscribed upon the
stars as the hope and trust of man, that a vir-
gin has conceived and brought forth a Son,
who verily is what Eve supposed she had when
she embraced her first-born — even " a man,
the Lord," Immanuel, God with us. Let us
rejoice and be glad that unto us a Child is
given, even that Seed of the woman appointed
to bruise the Serpent's head and be the ever-
lasting Shepherd and Guardian of His people.
Let us see in Jesus the great Healer, Teacher,
and Prophet, even God in humanity, who was
to come, and who, though despised and re-
jected of men, hated, condemned, and pierced,
still lives in immortal glory and power as the
true Arcturus^ to give repentance, remission
of sins, and eternal life to as many as accept
Him as their Lord and Saviour. And, in this
faith established, let us be all the more quick-
ened in our interest and attention in tracing

SUMMARY ON VIRGO. 89

the whole story as it shines upon us in our
darkness from God's everlasting stars. Even
the heathen bard, contemplating what was thus
fore-signified, and deeming the time of fulfil-
ment come, broke forth in the sone:

o

" Saturnian times
Roll round again, and mighty years, begun
From their first orb, in radiant circles run.
The base, degenerate iron offspring ends;
A golden progeny from heaven descends.
O chaste Lucinda ! speed the mother's pains,
And haste the glorious birth ! thy own Apollo reigns !
The lovely boy, with his auspicious face,
Shall Polio's consulship and triumph grace;
Majestic months set out with him to their appointed race,
The father banished virtue shall restore,
And crimes shall threat the guilty world no more.
The son shall lead the life of gods, and be
By gods and heroes seen, and gods and heroes see.
The jarring nations he in peace shall bind,
And with paternal virtues rule mankind."
8*

Eecture J^urtlj.

THE SUFFERING REDEEMER.

Rev. 5:9: " And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy,
. . . for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood."

REDEMPTION, the price of redemption,
and the heavenly honor of Him who
brings redemption, are the topics which come
to view in this text. And what was thus ex-
hibited to the enraptured Apocalyptist as he
stood within the heavenly portals gazing upon
the throne of the thrice-holy Lord God Al-
mighty, observing the Lamb as it had been
slain, and listening to the songs of the ador-
ing living- ones and elders, is the same to
which the second sign in the Zodiac intro-
duces us. Let us look at it with that devout
reverence which becomes a subject so sacred,
so solemn, and so mysterious.

The Sign of Libra.
There would seem to be little or nothing to
arrest our attention or to illuminate our faith
\n a matter so ordinary and unpoetical as a

THE SIGN OF LIBRA. 9 1

pair of balances for weighing commodities.
A more homely, secular, and every-day figure
would be hard to find, but a more expressive
one, or one more profoundly significant of the
weightiest truths that concern the hopes of
man, would be still harder to select when con-
sidered in the relations in which we here find
this figure. The arms of that tilting beam,
with its attached bowls, reach out into eter-
nities. The positions of that beam, which a
feather's weight may change, indicate the for-
tunes of worlds, the destinies of ages, the
estates of immortality. The equipoise of that
beam marks the adjustment of a vast and
mighty feud and the effectual bridging over
of a chasm as deep as hell.

And the whole instrument together, in use,
bespeaks the eternal justice which presides
over all the boundless universe. In the Per-
sian sphere a man or woman lifts these
scales in one hand, and grasps a lamb with
the other, the lamb being- the form of the an-
cient weight. Nor can we be mistaken when
we here read the divine determination of the
wages of sin and the price of redemption.

The figure of the Scales, or Balances, is
found in all the Eastern and most ancient
Zodiacs, the down side invariably toward the

92 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

deadly Scorpion. In some instances die bowl
on the low side was held by the Scorpion's
claws, whence, in some of the Western spheres,
Chelce, the Claws, occasionally occupied the.
place of the Scales. Among the Jews it was
denoted by the last letter of the Hebrew al-
phabet, T, or Tan, originally written as we
still write it, and as written in nearly all the
ancient alphabets, in the form of a cross,
which signified the end, the boundary, the
limit, the completion ; as the Saviour when
about to give up the ghost on the cross said,
" It is finished" the last letter in the history
of His humiliation having been reached.

The names of this sign indicate the range
of meaning attaching to it. In Hebrew it is
Mozanaim, the scales, lueighing, as where God
is said to weigdi the mountains in scales and
the hills in a balance. In Arabic, it is Al Zu-
bena, purchase, redemption, gain. In Coptic,
Lambadia, station or house of propitiation. In
the Arab tongue, Lam is graciousness, and
badia is branch — the atoning grace of the
Branch. In Greek it is called Zugos, the
cross-bar by which two oxen or horses draw,
the yoke, pulling against each other, thwarts
joining the opposite sides of a ship, the cross-
strap of a sandal, the balance-beam in weigh-

THE SIGN OF LIBRA. 93

ir.o-. The name of the first star in Libra is
Zuben al Genubi, the price deficient. Other
names are : Zuben al Shemali, the price which
covers; Al Gubi, heaped up high; Zuben
Akrabi, the price of the conflict.

The figure in this sign is largely associated
with the ethical impersonations of Astrea and
Athene of the Greek and Roman mythology,
who were the patrons of righteousness, jus-
tice, order, government, and the institutions
and powers of the state, by which rights were
protected, justice administered, and the gen-
eral good secured. The same figure still
connects with houses where courts are held,
where causes are tried, where accusations and
disputes are settled, and the awards of justice
declared and given.

All this clearly settles, as near as may be,
that this sign of the Zodiac has reference to
some great divine adjudications and adjust-
ments relating to defaults, defects, and accu-
sations, involving penalties, prices, payments.
And with these ideas applied to the continua-
tion of the story of the Seed of the woman,
the divine Son of the Virgin, promised and
appointed to lift up the fallen, recover from
the Serpent's power, and bring men to the
pasturages on the heavenly hillsides, we are

94 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

at once brought face to face with eternal jus-
tice weighing the demerits and awards of sin
on the one hand, and the price of redemption
rendered and paid for it on the other.

The Commercial Idea in Christianity.

There are some to whom this commercial
element in the system of our salvation is very
distasteful and repulsive. The natural heart
is prone to be offended with it, and to reject
it altogether. Rationalism proudly asserts
that sin is personal and intransferable ; that
the action or merit of one cannot be the ac-
tion or merit of another ; and that there can
be no such thing as a vicarious atonement, or
the release and justification from the penalties
of sin by the substitution of the work, suffer-
ings, or merit of a second party. Physically
considered, this may be true. The action of
one is necessarily the action of that one. But
there are spheres in which the action and force
of one may and does go to the account, or
the determination of the estate, of another.
It depends upon the relations of the parties
how far the doings of the one may accrue to
the good or ill condition of another. In the
case of a husband and wife, a father and
child, a king and his subjects, an army and

COMMERCIAL IDEA IN CHRISTIANITY. g$

the country for which it acts, the qualities and
activities, good or ill, on the one side most
certainly redound to the other side as well.
Sin is of the nature of a debt, and debt may
be as completely discharged by a friend of
the debtor as by the debtor himself. Sin is
of the nature of bondage, and release frori
bondage is a negotiable matter, and may be
procured at a valuation or price, which may
be equally paid by the bondman himself or
by some one else kind enough to pay it for
him. Many crimes and misdemeanors in hu-
man law have penalties dischargeable in money
consideration, which any friend of the crim-
inal may as truly satisfy as the convicted one,
and as may not be in the power of the convict
to do. Crimes depend on law, for where
there is no law there is no transgression ■ and
law is the will of government. If the gov-
ernment condemns in righteousness, in the
same righteousness it can adjudge and ac-
cept equivalent for the penalty, and there is
nothing to say nay to it. The notions of men
cannot bind the Supreme.

Remission of penalty is likewise something
entirely distinct from the moral estate of the
criminal. The justification or pardon of the
guilty one is another matter from his sancti-

g6 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

fication or personal goodness. The one is a
thing of price ; the other is a thing of power.
The one may be procured by a friend, medi-
ator, or surety ; the other must be wrought
into the experiences, affections, and impulses
of the man himself. The vicariousness of
redemption relates to justification, the keep-
ing of the law satisfied by an adequate and
accepted consideration, the holding back of
all the powers to hurt or condemn, and to
these only ; whilst another administration be-
tween the Redeemer and the one for whom
He answers takes charge of the inward fitting
of the absolved for the enjoyment of his free-
dom and his training for the kingdom of the
redeemed. And if the just and righteous
Sovereign of the universe, supreme in all His
perfections and rights, is agreed and content
to accept a certain price or equivalent for re-
leasing the culprit to the sanctifying and re-
forming administration of his friend or surety
on the payment of the price to governmental
justice, where is the wrong, or what is there
in the universe to question the rightfulness of
the proceeding ? Let the Redeemer be found
to pay the required ransom and to fill the
place of such an advocate, surety, and Lord,
and neither men, angels, nor devils have any

COMMERCIAL IDEA IN CHRISTIANITY. <jj

right on any ground to except to the proceed-
ing if the great Supreme is satisfied and
pleased, and says, So be it.

The only question to be decided is, whether
God in His word sets forth to our belief that
such is the arrangement in fact. We affirm
that such is the clear and unequivocal teach-
ing of the Scriptures from end to end. In all
the old prophecies, in all the ritual observances
connected with them, in all the New-Testament
promises, facts, teachings, and institutes, and
in all the visions of the final consummation, —
everywhere we find the doctrine of salvation
through the sacrifice of Christ as our Substi-
tute, Surety, and Propitiation. And this is
precisely what is signified by this sign of Li-
bra and its Decans.

In the place of the woman and her Seed we
have here a pair of balances suspended in the
sky, in which is signalled to us the inexorable
justice of the Almighty, in which the deficien-
cy and condemnation on the part of man, and
the all-sufficiency of the ransom paid on the
part of his Redeemer, are alike indicated.
One of the scales is up, which says to univer-
sal man, " Thou art weighed in the balances,
and art found wanting." The name of the
star which marks it records the verdict —

98 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

"The price deficient!' But the other side is
borne down, and with it the star named "The
pric? that covers." Of what that accepted price
was to consist is more fully told in the accom-
panying Decans.

The Southern Cross.
Strikingly enough, we here come upon a
figure stationed in the darkest section of the
heavens, in the very lowest part of the sphere,
and outlined by the stars themselves so as to
be readily recognized by every beholder — a
figure 0f the shameful instrument on which
the blessed Saviour died, even the Cross.
Our latitude is too far to the northward for
this constellation to be visible to us, but it is
clear, distinct, and specially noticeable to those
dwelling near or south of the equator. Hum-
boldt speaks with enthusiasm of this cross set
in stars of the southern sky. It was one of
the reveries of his youth, he tells us, to be able
to gaze upon that celestial wonder, and that it
was painful to him to think of letting go the
hope of some time beholding it. Such was
his enthusiasm on the subject that he says he
could not raise his eyes toward the starry
vault without thinking- of the Cross of the
South. And when he afterward saw it, it was

THE SOUTHERN CROSS. 99

with deep personal emotion, warmly shared
by such of the crew as had lived in those
southern regions ; and the more on their part
because religiously attached, as Humboldt
himself was not, to a constellation " the form
of which recalls the sign of the faith planted
by their ancestors in the deserts of the New
World." He describes this Cross as standing
perpendicular at the moment when it passes
the meridian. Up to that moment it leans
one way, and after that moment it begins to
lean the other way. It is therefore a most
convenient and marked timepiece, which the
people universally observe as such. " How
often," says this philosopher and traveller,
"have, we heard our guides exclaim in the
savannas of Venezuela or in the desert of
Lima, ' Midnight is past ; the Cross begins to
bend'!"

Formerly this constellation was visible in
our latitudes ; but in the gradual shifting of
the heavens it has long since sunk away to
the southward. It was last seen in the hori-
zon of Jerusalem about the time that Christ
was crucified. It consists of four bright stars
placed in the form of a cross, and is by far
the most conspicuous star-group in the south-
ern heavens. Standing directly in the path

IOO THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

of the second Decan of Virgo, the double-
natured Seed of the woman, and connecting
with Libra and the price of redemption, it
takes the same place in the celestial sym-
bology which the Cross of Calvary holds in
the Christian system.

The Sign of the Cross.
Ever since Christ Jesus " suffered for our
sins " the cross has been a sacred and most
significant emblem to all Christian believers.
Paul would glory in nothing but " in the cross
of our Lord Jesus Christ." It was a sacred
symbol long before Christ was born. We
find it in the most sacred connections, edifices,
feasts, and signs of the ancient Egyptians,
Persians, Assyrians, Hindoos, Chinese, Kamt-
schatkans, Mexicans, Peruvians, Scandinavians,
Gauls, and Celts. The mystic Tau, the won-
der-working caduceus, the invincible arrows,
the holy cakes, all had their fabled virtues in
connection with the form of the cross which
they bore. But that sign has received a far
more definite and certain consecration by the
death of Christ upon it. Its original ancient
meaning had reference to the Seed of the
woman, the divine Son who was to suffer on
it, to conquer by it, and to give eternal life

THE SIGN OF THE CROSS. 10 1

through it. We cannot adequately account
for it except as belonging to the original
prophecy and revelation concerning Him and
the price He was to pay for our redemption,
conquering through suffering, and giving life
through death. And in all the ideas connect-
ed with it by the ancient peoples we can read-
ily trace the application of it, the same as in
the arrangement of the constellations.

Aben Ezra gives its Hebrew name, Adorn,
which means cutting off, as the angel told
Daniel of the cutting off of the Messiah. And
Christ was cut off" by being condemned and
crucified.

In the Zodiac of Dendera this constellation
is marked by the figure of a lion, with his
head turned backward, and his tongue hang-
ing out of his mouth as if in consuming thirst.
It is the same idea. Christ is " the Lion of
the tribe of Judah," and one of the few ex-
pressions made by Him as he died on the
cross was that of His consuming thirst.
Strong and divine as He was, His life was
there parched out of Him. "Jesus, knowing
that all things were now accomplished, that
the Scripture might be fulfilled, saith, I thirst;
and they filled a sponge with vinegar and put
it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth.

102 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

When, therefore, he had received the vinegar,
he said, It is finished : and he bowed his head,
and gave up the ghost." The hieroglyphic
name attached means pouring water; and
David, impersonating the Messiah, exclaims,
" I am poured out like water, all my bones are
out of joint ; my heart is like wax ; it is melted
in the midst of my bowels. My strength is
dried up like a potsherd ; and my tongue
cleaveth to my jaws ; and thou hast brought
me into the dust of death" (Ps. 22 : 13-18).
It is simply wonderful how the facts in the
sign correspond with the showings of the
Scriptures, and how all the old myths embody
the same showings.

In the triad of the three great Egyptian
gods each holds the sacred Tau> or the cross,
as the symbol of life and immortality ; but
only the second, the Son, the Conqueror and
Deliverer, extends the cross, thus pictorially
expressing the offering of life and immortal-
ity through the Cross.

In the divine triad of Brahmanic deities the
second, the Son, the One who became incar-
nate in the man-god Krishna, sits upon his
throne cross-legged, holding the cross in his
right hand ; and he is the god of deliverance
from dangers and serpents. The same is

THE SIGN OF THE CROSS. 103

otherwise represented as the ruler of the
elements, the stiller of tempests, the good
genius in all earthly affairs. But in all these
relations and offices he always wears a cross
on his breast. It is the same story of deliv-
erance and salvation through the Cross-bear-
er, the divine Son of the Virgin. And even
so " it pleased the Father that in Christ should
all fulness dwell, and, making peace through
the blood of His cross, by Him to reconcile
all things."

The old Egyptians pictured departed spir-
its as birds with human heads, indicating the
laying off of the earthly form and the putting
on of immortality. But all such figures are
represented holding the a^oss, emblematic not
only of eternal life, but of that life as in, with,
or through the Cross, just as the Gospel
teaches.

The old Mexicans, at certain of their holy
feasts, made a cross composed of the flour of
maize and the blood of a victim offered in
sacrifice, which they first worshipped, and final-
ly broke in pieces, distributed the fragments
amono- themselves, and ate them in token of
union and brotherhood. The Egyptians and
others also had the sacred cake with the form
of a cross upon it, which the) ate in holy wor-

104 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ship. It was but another form of the same
idea — life and salvation through the Cross.

And in every aspect in which the figure of
this Decan, in its deeper inward significance,
appears in the records and remains of antiq-
uity, it connects with deliverance, life, and
salvation by means of it. Accordingly, it
stands among the starry symbols of the an-
cient astronomy precisely as it stands in our
blessed Christianity. It was placed there as
the sign of what holy prophecy had declared
should come, just as we reverence it as the
sign of what has come in Jesus of Nazareth,
the Virgin-born Redeemer of the world. It
is the Cross of Calvary prefigured on the
sky in token of the price at which our re-
demption was to be bought.

The Victim Slain.
The next in the series of these heavenly
signs gives us a still fuller and clearer indica-
tion of the nature and payment of that price.
Christ was not only " crucified," but He was
also " dead and buried." Hence we have in
the second Decan of Libra a slain victim,
pierced and slain with a dart barbed in the
form of the cross — pierced and slain by Cen-
taur himself. " The soul that sinneth, it shall

THE VICTIM SLAIN. 105

die ;" " Without shedding of blood there is
no remission." Hence the doctrine of the
Scriptures, that Christ's life was made an
offerine for sin — He who knew no sin con-
senting to be made a curse for us, that we
might be made righteous through Him. He
not only felt the cross, enduring its agony and
shame, but He died upon it — died for us, that
we might have eternal redemption through
His blood.

But an important element in the mysteri-
ous transaction was, that He sacrificed him-
self. Men in their wickedness killed Him,
but it was He who ^ave himself into their
hands to do it. Without this voluntariness
and self-command in the matter the great
redeeming virtue of His sacrifice would be
wanting. Hence He was particular to say as
He went to the cross, " I lay down my life for
the sheep. . . . No man taketh it from me, but
I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay
it down, and I have power to take it again"
(John 10 : 15-18). Hence He is preached as
the great High Priest passed into the heav-
ens, " who through the eternal Spirit offered
himself without spot to God," having "ap-
peared once in the end of the world to put
away sin by the sacrifice of himself" (Heb.

106 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

9 : ii, 26). This was partially prefigured by
the Cross in Centaur's path, but more par-
ticularly in this Decan, which shows the death
infliction by the barbed dart from His own
hand.

What this victim of Centaur is, is not very
definitely determined. Many of our modern
atlases give it as a wolf, but with no ancient
authority for it. The Greeks and Latins
sometimes called it the wolf; but they were
so much in doubt that they more commonly
called it the animal, the victim, without de-
scribing it. Ulugh Beigh says it was an-
ciently called Sura, a sheep or lamb. The
Arabs use a word in connection with it which
means to be slain, destroyed ; hence the slain
one, the victim. It plainly expresses slaying,
sacrifice by death ; and so would fall in with
that saying of the Apocalypse, that Christ is
" the Lamb slain from the foundation of the
world."

In some of the Coptic and Egyptian rep-
resentations this victim is a naked youth, a
stripped and unresisting young man, with his
finger on his mouth. This youth is Hows,
the beloved son of Osiris and the virgin, the
One to come, who appears in various rela-
tions under different names, all more or less

THE VICTIM SLAIN. 107

connected with the brinoqnor 0f Hfe anc[ bless-
edness through humiliation and death. In
Phoenician this youth is called Harpocratesy
under which name he became known to the
Greeks and Romans. Harpocrates means jus-
tice, or the victim of justice, the vindication of
the majesty of law. Among the Romans, Har-
pocrates was the god of silence, quiet submis-
sion, and acquiescence. All of this connects
with this Decan as a sign of the promised One,
and prefigured Him as quietly and meekly
submitting as a victim and sacrifice to justice
and the law, even as Christ did actually lay
down His life and submit himself as our pro-
pitiation. "As a sheep before her shearers
is dumb, so He opened not His mouth."

In some of the pictures of this youth he is
represented with the horn of a goat on one
side of his head, as well as with his finger on
his lips. This again connects him with sacri-
fice— willing, silent sacrifice. In some other
pictures this horn is detached and held in his
hand, filled with fruits and flowers — the orie-
inal of the cornucopia, or horn of plenty ; thus
signifying that all good to man comes through
that meek submission to stripping and sacri-
fice to satisfy the requirements of eternal
righteousness.

IOS THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

So, then, from every side we get the idea
of silent submission to death as a slain vic-
tim, and the bringing in thereby of a plentiful
and everlasting provision for all the wants
of man ; prefiguring exactly what the Gospel
sets forth as fulfilled in Jesus Christ, who,
" being found in fashion as a man, humbled
himself, and became obedient unto death,
even the death of the cross" (Phil. 2 : 5-8).

The Turn in the History.

But the Cross, and Christ's death by the
Cross, mark the limit and farthest boundaries
of the humiliation for human redemption
There was nothing lower than that in the
history; and the first two Decans of Libra are
the southernmost constellations but one in the
ancient astronomy. From the moment that
Jesus gave up the ghost the price was paid,
the whole debt was discharged, and every-
thing gave token of change. The tide there
reached its lowest ebb, and turned, thencefor-
ward to flow in ever-augmenting volume from
glory to glory.

The bones of the two thieves were broken,
but the death of Jesus, already accomplished,
spared His body that indignity. A man high
in office and estate moved to take charge of

THE TURN IN THE HISTORY. IO9

His remains for honorable sepulture in an
honorable tomb. Imperial Rome lent its sol-
diers and its seal to guard and protect them
in the place of their rest. The earth and sky
gave signs of sympathy, and yielded attesta-
tions which drew even from heathen lips the
confession of His divinity. A few days, and
hell stood confounded before His majesty,
and the doors of the grave gave way, and
angels in white array stood round the spot
to welcome His forthcoming in the powers of
an endless life. Far above all principalities
and powers, and every name that is named,
He ascended, and for ever sat down at the
rio-ht hand of the Father, the o-reat Procurer
and sovereign Giver of all good and grace.
He acepted death, consented to quit his earth-
ly life, agreed to take his place with departed
spirits, " died for our sins according to the
Scriptures" (i Cor. 15:3); but thence as-
cended where the heavens resound with the
new song, " Thou art worthy, for Thou wast
slain, and hast redeemed us to God by Thy blood"
Now, then, " we see Jesus, who was made a
little lower than the angels for the suffering
of death, crowned with glory and honor"
(Heb. 2:9). His shameful Cross issued in
a Qrlorious Throne.

10

ho the gospel in the stars.

The Northern Crown.
And so we find it foreshown in these starry
pictures. That Southern Cross connects with
the Northern Crown. The one is a Cross
formed of stars, and the other is equally a
Crown formed of stars. The third Decan of
Libra is the Corona Borealis, vertical over Je-
rusalem once in every revolution of the earth.

" The golden circlet mounts, and, as it flies,
Its diamonds twinkle in the distant skies."

The Greeks say that this was the bridal-
gift of Bacchus to Ariadne, the woman who
through her love for Theseus came to her
death by the hand of Artemis, or, according
to another story, was so ill treated in her af-
fection that she put an end to her own life,
but was saved by the god, who became so
pleased with her beauty that he raised her to
a place among immortals, and gave her this
crown of stars. It was but a clumsy and
carnalized version of the story recorded in
the primeval astronomy. Not a woman, but
a man, even the Seed of the woman, is the
subject. It was through His great love to
mortals that He came to grief, neglect, perse-
cution, and death. That death was the di-
vinely-exacted price which had to be paid in

A SNEER. US

bringing the object of His love out of the
dark labyrinth of sin and condemnation ; but
it was at the same time by His own free will
and choice. He was brought up again out
of death in immortal beauty and glory, and
through the good pleasure and delight of the
Father was awarded an imperishable crown
in heaven. And that heavenly crown had its
sien in this beautiful constellation. In its

o

true original this story of Ariadne and her
crown is the same as that of the great Re-
deemer, giving up, and himself sacrificing,
His life for the objects of His love, raised
from the dead in immortal glory, that at the
name of Jesus every knee should bow, and
every tongue confess that He is Lord, to the
glory of God the Father.

Thus, then, the prophetic sign in the stars
is fulfilled in the facts of the history.

A Sneer.
1 have heard intimated that this is all spec-
ulation. It may suit some to dismiss it in
that way. But will those who think it noth-
ing but speculation tell us, then, what is not
speculation ? The French savants, whom many
reverence as the high priests of reason over
against all credulity and superstition, take it

112 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

as solid enough to build on it an argument
against Christianity ; why, then, is it not solid
enough to build on it an argument for Chris-
tianity ? Some think it speculation to hold
for truth that there is a personal God ; that
the Bible contains a revelation from Him ;
that man has a soul to live beyond death;
that there is to be a future judgment ; that
the earth is a globe in motion ever rolling
around the sun ; or that Jesus Christ is the
appointed and only Saviour of fallen man ; —
are we therefore to put all these things from
us as empty dreams? Believing the Bible,
we believe that God from the beginning
promised a divine Seed of the woman to
bruise Satan's head, and through suffering
and death to bring in everlasting redemption
for man ; that He has come as the Son of the
virgin, born at Bethlehem, crucified on Cal-
vary, buried in Joseph's tomb, resurrected the
third day, opening the kingdom of heaven to
all believers. Dare we for an instant allow
that this is mere speculation ? And if what
we read in the book of God is not specula-
tion, can it be mere speculation when we find
it written with the same clearness on the stars ?
It is not above a child's capacity to judge
whether the story thus told by the constella-

NOT SPECULATION. 113

tions answers to the story of the Gospel or
not ; and, seeing the correspondence, are we
not to conclude that the one is the prophetic
foretelling and anticipation of the other ? If
not, I am at a loss to know what, in all the
rounds of human belief or unbelief, is not
mere speculation. No, no ; the story of the
Cross of Christ is true, and the word on the
heavens unites with the word in the Book to
assure us of the certainty of our faith.

" My trust is in the Cross ; there lies my rest,

My fast, my sole delight.
Let cold-mouthed Boreas, or the hot-mouthed East,

Blow till they burst with spite ;
Let earth and hell conspire their worst, their best,

And join their twisted might ;
Let showers of thunderbolts dart round and round me,

And troops of fiends surround me :
All this may well confront ; all this shall ne'er confound me."

10* H

ILccture jfifti).

THE TOILING DELIVERER.

Fs. 91 : 13: "Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the
young lion and the dragon shalt Thou trample under foot."

IT is generally accepted by the old inter-
preters that the word "lion" in this text
should be taken as denoting some venomous
thing, either reptile or insect, of a class with
serpents. Bochart thinks it means " the black
serpent." Patrick takes the description as
meaning "serpents, asps, and dragons, with
all the rest of those venomous sorts of crea-
tures." The Saviour recurs to this passage
where He says, " I give you power to tread
on serpents and scorpions, and over all the
power of the enemy" (Luke 19:19). Ac-
cordingly, we find both the Psalmist and the
Saviour using the precise imagery of the
sign of the Zodiac and its Decans which we
are now to consider. A gigantic scorpion,
serpent, and dragon, with a mighty man in
conflict with them, mastering them and tread-
ing them under foot, is the figure before us.

114

FA ULTY EXP LA NA TIONS. 1 1 5

Some have attempted to explain the origin
and meaning of these signs of the Zodiac as
gradual formations for season-marks, of sow-
ing, reaping, fishing, hunting, cattle-culture,
and the like. Abbe Pluche, in his History of
the Heavens > thinks to exhaust the whole mat-
ter after this manner, though it is hard to see
the need for such high and elaborate memo-
rials of what was otherwise far more obvious
to the senses. And although some of these
signs apply, and have been used, in this way,
the abbe is obliged to admit that the scheme
does not fit to Egypt, where many say these
signs originated ; neither does it fit any-
where else ; whilst it leaves all the Decans of
these signs wholly unexplained. And, how-
ever well the theory may here or there fall
in with some of the signs, it is much per-
plexed and disabled when it comes to such
as Scorpio, since the scorpion is nowhere a
thing of game or cultivation, and has no par-
ticular season. The best the abbe can do
with it on this theory is, to expound it as a
sign of autumnal diseases, to tell the people
when they were most likely to be sick ! Had
the abbe taken the very significant hints given
in some of his quotations, telling how these
signs were explained to those initiated into

110 THE GOSTEL IN THE STARS.

the more famous ancient mysteries, he would
have saved himself such puerilities, and found
what he so trifled with to be the records of
truths relating to the highest spiritual and
eternal interests of man.

The Ancient Mysteries.
Pluche quotes from Isocrates, Epictetus, and
Tully on the subject, who unequivocally testify
that there these signs were explained through-
out in a manner indicating most important
truths of a sort to give peace in life and hope
in death. "Those who are acquainted with
the mysteries," says the first, " insure to them-
selves very pleasing hopes against the hour
of their death, as well as for the whole course
of their lives." " All these mysteries," adds
Epictetus, " have been established by the
ancients to regulate the life of men and to
banish disorders therefrom." Tully says :
" When these mysteries are explained and
brought again to their trite meaning, we prove
not to have learned so much the nature of
the gods [heathen deities] as that of the
things themselves or of the truths we stand
in need of. . . . The instructions given there
have taught men not only how to live in peace
and gentleness, but how to die in the hopes of

THE SIGN OF SCORPIO. 117

a better state to come!' But what had the rais-
ing of good crops, the production of calves,
lambs, and goats, and the timing of the fish-
ing and hunting seasons to do with the hopes
and prospects of the soul sinking away from
earth into the mysterious eternity ? And if
these sioms and asterisms, in " their true mean-
ine," had reference to the soul and its immor-
tal hopes, and were so explained in the noblest
of the mysteries, it only shows that among the
pagans, notwithstanding all their idolatry and
darkness, the true prophetic light still feebly
lingered by means of these primeval writings
on the stars. And, with the rest of these
comforting and hopeful records on the sky,
this sign of the Scorpion has equal place and
significance.

The Sign of Scorpio.
The name of this sign in Arabic and Syriac
is Al Akrab, which, as a name, means the
scorpion, but also wounding, conflict, war.
David uses the root of this word (Ps. 144 : 1)
where he blesses God for teaching his hands
to war. In Coptic the name is Isidis, attack
of the enemy — a word from the same root
which occurs in Hebrew (Ps. 17:9) in the
sense of oppression from deadly foes. The

Il8 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

word scorpion itself is formed from a root
which means to cleave in conflict or battle, and
this sign in the Zodiac is the house of Mars,
the god of war and justice. The principal
star in this sign is called Antares, wounding,
rutting, tearing.

The scorpion, as a living thing, is a spider-
like insect, formed something like a small lob-
ster, with an extended chain-like tail ending
in a crooked horny sting loaded with irritant
poison. To be struck by a scorpion is often
fatal, though not necessarily so ; but the pain
from it is the intensest that can be inflicted
on the human body. It is the most irascible
and malignant insect that lives, and its poison
is like itself. And in this sign we have the
figure of a mammoth scorpion, with its tail
uplifted in anger as in the act of striking.
The figure, the names, and all the indications
agree in telling us that we here have the story
of a most malignant conflict, and of a deadly
wounding in that conflict.

The Suffering Saviour.
How clearly and fully all this corresponds
to the great conflict of Christ, and His dear-
bought victory in achieving our redemption,
any one can easily trace. The text exhibits

THE SUFFERING SAVIOUR. I IQ

Him as victor in just such a conflict. Though
it refers to the success of God's people in gen-
eral, and their security under the shadow of
the Almighty, the New Testament applies the
passage to Christ, who is always the kernel
of everything pertaining to the powers and
triumphs of His people. What they get, they
get in and through His going before them in
the matter. He is to His Church what the
head is to the body — the chief of the whole
thing, without which all the rest is powerless
and nothing. Therefore we must understand
the declaration as including Him and as re-
ferring pre-eminently to Him. It accordingly
represents Him as in conflict with serpents,
scorpions, asps, dragons, and all deadly and
venomous things, just as in this sign and its
Decans.

In the Egyptian Zodiac this sign is repre-
sented by a monster serpent, Typhon, or
Python, the hundred-headed son of a malig-
nant, envious, and intractable shrew, the fa-
ther of the many-headed dog of hell, of the
Lernaean Hydra, and of the three-headed, fire-
breathine Chimaera. In the Hebrew Zodiac
this sign was counted to Dan ; and Dan is
described as " a serpent by the way, and an
adder in the path." Scorpio certainly ranks

120 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Wl

ith the Serpent, and stands in close affinity

ith the Dragon.

The Serpent's seed is everywhere and al-
ways the enemy of the woman's Seed ; and
the conflict is above all between Christ and
the Devil, until all evil is finally subdued and
crushed. The great office of the divine Son
of the woman, and his experience in it, were
sketched from the beginning, as the bruising
of the Serpent's head and the bruising of His
heel. No sooner did Christ come into the
world than the Dragon sought to devour
Him through Herod's executioners. No soon-
er had He come up from the waters of bap-
tism, attested from the open heavens as the
Messiah, the Son of God, than the Devil
made attack upon Him. And as He came
to the final act of discharging the debt of a
condemned world, the most terrible of all the
assaults of the powers of darkness had to be
encountered.

We know something of the wrestling and
agony which our Saviour suffered in the Gar-
den of Gethsemane. We know how sorrow-
fuj was His soul, as though His immortal beino-
were about to be broken up. We know how
He was inwardlv wrung- with anguish until
every pore issued sweat of blood, clotting on

THE SERPENT. 121

His body and falling in great drops to the
ground. It was " the hour of the powers of
darkness," as He himself explained. It was
an experience of agony the like of which
never had been, and never could be again.
It was the sting and poison of the great
Scorpion struck into the Son of God, making
all His glorious nature vibrate as if in disso-
lution. It was the prophetic sign of the Zo-
diac fulfilled in the Seed of the virgin.

The Serpent.

A further confirmation that we are on the
right track in thus interpreting this sign is the
fact that the first Decan, or illustrative side-
piece, presents us with a picture of the Ser-
pent itself in all its giant proportions.

It was the particular admonition to the
Church in Philadelphia : " Hold fast that thou
hast, that no one take thy crown." We have
likewise seen in the preceding sign that there
was held forth a celestial crown for Him who
was to suffer on the cross. It was for the joy
thus set before Him that the Apostle says He
"endured the cross, despising the shame."
On the other hand, mythology represents
Python as aiming to acquire the sovereignty
of gods and men, and only prevented from

122 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

gaining it by the struggle which ensued be-
tween him and the greatest of the Olympian
gods. That myth was simply the story of
this constellation, for here the Serpent is
stretching after the celestial Crown, has al-
most reached it, and is only kept from taking
it by being held fast by a manly figure grasp-
ing him firmly with both hands.

This serpent in the Decan is, of course, to
be construed with the Scorpion in the sign, as
the one is expository of the other ; just as
Spica in Virgo is to be construed with the
Infant in Coma. The conflict in both cases is
the same, only the images are changed to give
a somewhat further impression of it. In the
first instance it is the Evil One attacking- and
inflicting the intensest of anguish ; in the
other, it is a fierce contest for the Crown.

I will not here discuss the question whether
it was a literal serpent that tempted Eve. I
suppose some earthly serpentine form in the
case, but whether it had wines or oreans of

o o

speech matters not to the integrity of the
record or of the ideas meant to be conveyed.
The simple narrative, as it strikes the common
mind, is as clear and satisfactory as any learn-
ed expositions can make it. The physical
creature was not the real enactor of the

THE SERPENT. I 23

temptation, but was the image associated
with a dark and subtle intelligence operating
in that form to deceive and ruin our first pa-
rents. And from that, for ever afterward, the
figure of a serpent became the universal sym-
bol and representative of that Evil Spirit,
hence called the Dragon, that old Serpent,
the Devil, and Satan, who is the arch-enemy
of all good, the opponent of God and the
deceiver of men. And it is as the symbol
of this evil power that these serpentine fig-
ures appear in the constellations.

The Bible everywhere assures us of the
existence of a personal Devil and Destroyer,
just as it everywhere describes a personal
God and Redeemer. It tells us plainly whence
he came, what he is, what power he wields,
and what is to be his fate, just as it tells whence
Christ is, who He is, for what purpose He
came into the world, and what is to be the re-
sult of His marvellous and complex admin-
istrations.

The doctrine of a Saviour necessarily im-
plies the doctrine of a destroyer. The one is
the counterpart of the other, and belief in both
is fundamental to the right explanation of
things, as well as to our proper safety. Men
may doubt and question, and treat the idea

124 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

of a personal Devil as a foolish myth, but
their language nevertheless bewrayeth the
unfittingness of their skepticism. The doc-
trine is in the oldest, worthiest, and divinest
records ever made for human enlightenment,
and in the common belief of all nations and
peoples from the beginning of the world.
And here we have it pictured and repeated
at every turn of the starry configurations,
precisely as we find it presented in the sacred
Scriptures. Nor can we be on the safe side
without honestly receiving and believing it.
People may make a jest of it if they will, but
they will find out some day that this story of
the Serpent is a terrible reality.

Ophiuchus.
Any attentive reader of the Scriptures will
observe how constantly the Redeemer of the
world is represented in the attitude and cha-
racter of a Physician, a Healer, a Mollifier of
wounds, a Deliverer from the power of dis-
ease and death. Before He was born the
prophets fore-announced Him as " the Sun
of Righteousness " who should " arise with
healing in His wings" — as He "with whose
stripes we are healed" — as He who ''healeth
the broken in heart, and bindeth up their

OPHIUCHUS. 125

wounds " — as He who saith, " O death, I will
be thy plagues ; O grave, I will be thy de-
struction." So the record of Him in the New
Testament is that He "went about all Galilee,
preaching the Gospel of the kingdom, and
healine all manner of sickness and all manner
of disease among the people," and giving
every demonstration of power to make good
His word, that if any one would receive
His teachings and believe on Him that sent
Him, the same should never see death, and be
raised to life eternal at the last day. His great
complaint against men ever was, and is, that
they come not unto Him that they might have
life. And this again is accurately and most
strikingly presented in the second Decan of
Scorpio and the myths connected with it.

We have here the figure of a mighty man
wrestling until he is bald with a gigantic ser-
pent, grasping the same with both hands, dis-
abling the monster by his superior power, and
effectually holding him fast so that he cannot
get the crown. With one foot lifted from the
scorpion's tail as stung and hurt, he is in the
act of crushing that scorpion's head with the
other. He thus appears as the one who hath
power over the Serpent and over death, hold-
ing, disabling, and destroying them, though
11 *

126 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

himself wounded in His conflict with them.
Such is also the representation of Krishna in
two sculptured figures in one of the oldest
existing- pagodas of Hindostan.

In one of the old Egyptian spheres the pic-
ture is that of a man enthroned, wearing the
head of an eagle or a hawk, the enemy and
slayer of the serpent, and assigned a Coptic
name which means the chief who cometh.
But the more common figure is that which
appears on our modern atlases, whom the
Greeks in their own language called Ophiu-
c/ms, the Serpent-holder, otherwise, from two
Arabic words signifying the same thing, Che-
leb Afei or sEsculapiits, who figures so illus-
triously in the mythologies and worships of
Greece and Rome.

The Great Physician.
This /Esculapius was held to be one of the
worthiest of the gods. It was to him that the
great Socrates in his last hours sacrificed a
cock. His temples were everywhere, and
everywhere frequented and honored. But,
though regarded as a god, the son of Apollo,
or the Sun, Homer applies epithets to him
never applied to a god, and the greatest of
his achievements are mostly ascribed to him

THE GREAT PHYSICIAN. \2"/

in the sphere and activities of a man. He
therefore comes to view as both god and
man, after the same style as the Seed of the
woman in the Scriptures. He is assigned
seven children, who were simply personifica-
tions of his own qualities and powers, their
names further describing him as the Healer,
the Physician, the Desired One, the Health-
giver, the Beautifier with good health, the
One who brings cure, the Universal Remedy.
The story is, that he not only cured all the
sick, but called the dead to life again by means
of blood from the side of the goddess of jus-
tice and from the slain Gorgon, and finallv
himself suffered death from the lightnings of
heaven because of the complaints against him
by the god of hell, but was nevertheless raised
to glory through the influence of Apollo. In
all the representations he is invariably accom-
panied with the symbol of the serpent.

Many hypotheses have been broached to
account for the origin of the story and illus-
trious worship of y'Esculapius ; and I cannot
but wonder that no one has ever thought of
tracing it to the primeval astronomy and to
this conspicuous constellation of Serpentarius>
to which it most certainly belongs. Taking
these signs, as I hold them to be, the pictorial

128 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

records of the primitive revelation concerning
the Seed of the woman, we at once strike the
heart of a complete explanation of every fea-
ture of the myth, which at the same time very
wonderfully confirms the correctness of so
accepting these signs. Here is the man with
the serpent, as was ^Esculapius. Here is
the Seed of the woman, the Son of God.
Here is the Serpent-holder and the Death-
vanquisher, hence the matchless Physician and
Healer.

It may seem strange to identify ^Esculapius
with Christ, nor do we say that ^sculapius
was Christ ; but we do say that the constella-
tion out of which came the heathen leeend
concerning y£sculapius was the picture and
sign of the promised Sun of Righteousness,
the Healer and Saviour of mankind. As
truly as Spica denotes the Seed of the virgin,
Serpentarius denotes that same Seed ; and
the whole story of /Esculapius thus found its
hero, its features, and its names from the prim-
itive prophecies and promises concerning the
Virgin's Son, as pictured in this constellation.
Everything characteristic in the myth was in
some sense prophetic of what should be, and
was, fulfilled in Jesus of Nazareth. Christ is
the true Sun of Righteousness, the great

THE GREAT PHYSICIAN. I 29

Healer, the heavenly Physician, the Desired
One, the sublime Restorer of soul and body,
the Beautifier with health and salvation, the
Bringer of cure for suffering and perishing
humanity, the Universal Remedy for all the
ills which sin has wrought. He is the potent
Holder of the Serpent, the Vanquisher of
death. He is the Resurrection and the Life,
who raiseth up the dead by virtue of the
blood taken from the virgin in taking her
nature, and the blood of the Gorgon van-
quished by His power. And He it was who
died from the divine thunderbolts as a Sin-
bearer to silence the clamors of perdition,
and yet, on the plea of His merit and divinity,
was raised up and enthroned in highest heav-
en as the very God of salvation.

His identity with what the myth represented
appears also very strikingly in a certain an-
cient prophetic hymn to ^Esculapius, fabled
as inspired and sung at the time of his birth
— a hymn with these remarkable lines, which
the angels might be supposed to sing over

the manner of Bethlehem :
<_>

" Hail, great Physician of the world ! all hail !
Hail, mighty Infant, who, in years to come,
Shall heal the nations and defraud the tomb !
Swift be Thy growth ! Thy triumphs unconfined!
Make kingdoms thicker and increase mankind :
I

I30 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Thy daring art shall animate the dead,
A.nd draw the thunder on Thy guilty head ;
For Thou shalt die, but from the dark abode
Rise up victorious, and be twice a God!"

The whole showing of the constellation,
and of the mythic story connected with it,
thus wonderfully accords with what the proph-
ets anticipated and the New Testament teaches
concerning- the divine Son of the virgin.

Hercules.
And still more fully is the Messianic work
of the bruising of the Serpent's head set forth
in the third constellation belonging to this
sign. Here is the figure of a mighty man,
down on one knee, with his heel uplifted as
if wounded, having a great club in one hand
and a fierce three-headed monster held fast
in the other, whilst his left foot is set directly
on the head of the great Dragon. Take this
figure according to the name given it in the
Egyptian hieroglyphics, and you have a picture
of Him who cometh to bruise the Serpent and
" destroy the works of the Devil." In the
head of this figure is a bright star, the bright-
est in this constellation, which bears the name
of Ras al Gethi, which means the Head of
him 'who bruises ; whilst the name of the sec-
ond star means The Branch kneeling. The

HERCULES. 1 3 I

Phoenicians worshipped this man five genera-
tions before the times of the Greeks, and hon-
ored him as representing a saviour. Smith
and Sayce trace the legend of him in Chalclea
four thousand vears a^o. On the atlases he
is called Hercules. So the Romans called
him, but the Greeks called him Herakles,
whom they worshipped and honored as the
greatest of all their hero-gods, principally on
account of his twelve great labors.

According to the mythic accounts, Herakles
or Hercules was the god-begotten man, to
whose tasks there was scarce an end. From
his cradle to his death he was employed ac-
complishing the most difficult and wonderful
of feats laid upon him to perform, and all in
the line of vanquishing great evil powers,
such as the lion begotten from Typhon, the
many-headed Hydra sprung from the same
parentage, the brazen -footed and golden-
horned stag, the Erymanthean boar, the vast
filth of the Augean stables, the swarms of
life-destroying Stymphalian birds, the mad
bull of Crete which no mortal dased look
upon, the flesh-eating mares of Diomedes,
the queen of the devastating Amazons, the
triple-bodied Geryones and his dog, the Drag-
on which guarded the apples of the Hesper-

132 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ides, and the three-headed snaky monstei
which kept the gates of hell.

Some have argued that the story of Her-
akles is a purely Greek invention, but it cer-
tainly dates back in all its essential features,
in Egypt, Phoenicia, and India, to a time long
anterior to the Greeks. By their own con-
fession the Greeks did not even understand
who or what Herakles was, or what was meant
by all his great labors. They took him for
the sublimest of the hero-gods, as the ac-
counts came to them, and here and there, as
in so many other things, appropriated all to
their own country and people ; but Aratus,
who sunsr the song- of the ancient constella-
tions, and from whose song the Apostle Paul
makes a quotation, speaks of Herakles as

" An image none knows certainly to name,
Nor what he labors for,''

and, again, as

" The inexplicable image."

Ptolemy and Manilius refer to him in cor
responding terms. They could not make out
their greatest hero, or any meaning to his
works ! Not with them, therefore, did the
mythic story of the powerful laborer origi-
nate. Its true original is in the ancient con-

A PICTURE OF CHRIST. 1 33

Stella tions of the primeval astronomy, which,
like the Scriptures, pointed to the coming
Seed of the woman to bruise, vanquish, and
destroy the Serpent, and everything of the
Serpent born or belonging to the Serpent's
kincrdom.

A Picture of Christ.
Stripped of its foul heathenisms and ad-
mixtures, we can easily trace throughout the
myth all the outlines of the astronomic pic-
ture, and that picture anticipating the sublime
work of the Virgin's Son, as depicted by the
prophets and recorded in the Gospel, even
the battering and vanquishing of Satan and
all the powers of darkness. Christ is the
God-begotten man. He it is that comes
against the roaring satanic "lion" who "go-
eth about seeking whom he may devour."
He it is that came into the world to strike off
the heads of the great Serpent, lurking in the
bogs to ravage and destroy. He it is who
comes forth to free the world of all its mon-
sters and hellish pests, and purge it of its
vast uncleanness. He it is who had it laid
upon Him to fight and slay the Dragon, and
thus recover access to the fruits of the Tree
of Life, though having to bear the whole
12

134 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

weight of a guilty world in making the grand
achievement. And He it is who "descended
into hell," before whom the spirits of the un-
der-world cowered ; to whose power the king
of perdition yielded ; and who grasped the
struggling triple-headed dragon-dog in charge
of the infernal gates, and bore him off, " lead-
ing captivity captive." Wounded He was in
the dreadful encounter — wounded in His heel,
wounded unto death, yet living still ; suffering
also from the poisoned garment of others'
sins, mounting the funeral-pyre to die of His
own accord amid fires undue to Him, and
thence ascending amid the clouds to immortal
honor in heaven, with his foot for ever on the
head of the foe.

The heathen in their blindness could not
understand the story, and knew not what to
make of the foreshowing ; but in the light of
God's fuller revelation, and of the facts at-
tested by the Gospel, we read the origin and
meaning of it all, and see how God has been
all these ages proclaiming from the starry sky
the glories, labors, sufferings, and triumphs of
His only-begotten Son, our Saviour.

There is no character in mythology around
which great and wondrous incidents crowd so
thickly as around Herakles, and there is no

A PICTURE OF CHRIST. 135

character in the history of the world upon whom
so much of interest and sublime achievement
centres as upon Jesus Christ, the true Deliver-
er. With Him was the wielding of power un-
known to any other man. To kill Him and to
be rid of Him has ever been the intensest wish
of all the Dragon brood, from the time Herod
sought the young child's life even unto this
present. With all sorts of ill and wrong was
He smitten while He lived, and plotted against
in all the ages by the jealous, obstinate, and
quarrelsome goddess of false wisdom and
serpentine intrigue against the will and word
of Heaven. Even the sensual and disgusting
loves of Herakles were but heathen and
carnal perversions of the devotion to the
interest and redemption of man which ever
elows in the Saviour's breast and shines in
all His varied works. And as Herakles and
all his tremendous labors were totally inex-
plicable on any motives perceptible to ordi-
nary reason, so is Christ the everlasting mys-
tery, incomprehensible and unconstruable, in
His life, deeds, or institutes, to all who fail to
accept and believe in Him as verily the God-
man, come, and still coming, to work the
works given Him to do, through suffering,
toil, and sacrifice to deliver an afflicted world

136 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

— come, and still coming, to beat down Satan
and spoil all the principalities and powers of
evil.

Thus, then, in this sign and its constella-
tions, and in the myths founded on and asso-
ciated with them, we have the precise picture
presented in the text — the picture of the
promised Seed of the woman treading on
serpents, asps, dragons, and the whole brood
of venomous powers — suffering and dying in
the conflict, but in the end trampling all ene-
mies in glorious triumph beneath His feet.

We wonder betimes what is to come ot
this unceasing conflict between right and
wrong, good and bad, which we see raging
around us in all things — this creeping in
everywhere of scorpions and adders to sting
and hurt — this twining and hissing of ser-
pents and all horrid things — this everlasting
toil, expenditure, and suffering for the better,
which never seems to come. A glance at
these constellations may serve to tell us, the
same as promised in the Holy Book. There
can be no deliverance without it, and long and
oppressive must the struggle be. Many a
serpent must first be strangled, many a hy-
dra attacked, many a wild passion caught and
slain, many a pang endured, many a sore re-

A PICTURE OF CHRIST. 1 37

verse experienced. But the cause is secure.
The victory must come at last. God and truth
and right and good must triumph in the end.
The Ophiuchus who holds fast will not lose
his crown. The scorpion may sting the heel,
but the foot will crush its head. The faithful
wielder of the club of righteousness may be
brought to his knee, but he shall yet lift up
the instrument of his power in glorious suc-
cess, strangle Cerberus, and bear off in triumph
the apples of gold, whilst the great Dragon
writhes through all his length with his head
under the heel of the Conqueror. For from
of old it stands written, "Thou shalt tread
upon the serpent and adder ; the young lion
and the dragon shalt Thou trample under

foot."

12*

SLcrture JDtxtlj,

THE TRIUMPHANT WARRIOR.

Ps. 45 : 4, 5 : " And in Thy majesty ride prosperously, because of
truth and meekness and righteousness; and Thy right hand shall
teach Thee terrible things. Thine arrows are sharp in the heart of the
King's enemies."

THESE words are from one of the most
glowing of the Psalms, in the writing
of which David's heart boiled with goodly
words. It is marked : " To the chief Musi-
cian upon Shoshannim, for the sons of Korah
— Maschil. A song of loves." The lily-in-
strument, the master-performer, and the whole
body of singers were called into requisition
for its rendering. As a sublime ode it was
to be given with the sublimest skill, for it re-
lates to the loveliest of heroes in the loveli-
est of His aspects, offices, and relations to
His people. This hero is none other than
the promised Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ,
in His royal majesty and glory subsequent to
His resurrection, and as to be hereafter re-
vealed. When on earth He was despised
and rejected of men, but here He is cele-

138

THE TRIUMPHANT WARRIOR. 1 39

brated as " beautiful, beautiful, above the sons
of man," endowed with every grace and in-
vested with all authority and power. When
on earth He was meek and non-resistant, not
breaking so much as a bruised reed , but here
He is contemplated and addressed as a mount-
ed warrior, riding as a king, armed with bow
and arrows, shooting down His enemies. His
character here is that of the Mighty One,
girding himself with honor and majesty, and
going forth to victory. John, in his visions
of the future, beheld "a white horse ; and He
that sat on him had a bow ; and He went
forth conquering and to conquer." It is the
same divine Hero, in the same character, of-
fices, and work, in both instances. He has a
crown, a throne, and a cause — the cause of
righteousness over against injustice, usurpa-
tion, and tyranny; which cause He enforces
with invincible majesty. His former suffer-
ings are now turned to aromatic perfumes
upon Him. Out of the ivory palaces He is
gladdened with the sound of the harp. And
in glory and triumph He rides forth unto
victory, hailed by the daughters of kings and
worshipped by the queen at his right hand
arrayed in the gold of Ophir.

The picture is particularly magnificent,

14-0 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

We cannot contemplate it without sharing
the enthusiasm with which the inspired Psalm-
ist sketched it. But the surprising thing is,
that it is also in the Zodiac, and appears at
full length in

The Sign of Sagittarius.

In this sign we have again the double-na-
tured Seed of the virgin, the Son of God as
the Son of man. The figure is that of a
mighty warrior with bow and arrows, riding
prosperously. In all tongues he is named,
as in our charts, the Archer, the Bowman, He
who sends forth the arrow. In form he is the
Centaur > the Piercer — not now, however, in
connection with the Cross, far down toward
the hidden regions, offering himself as a
victim and sacrifice to satisfy the demands of
justice, but lifted up on high, stationed on the
path of the Sun, himself the Sun of Right-
eousness rising in His majesty.

The Greeks called him Cheiron, the Execu-
te^ the chief centaur, whom they described
as " the righteous-dealing centaur," precisely
as this Psalm represents the Horseman and
Hero of whom it speaks. Other centaurs
were considered mean and beneath humanity,
as Christ was accounted in His humiliation ;

THE SIGN OF SAGITTARIUS. HI

but with Cheiron everything noble, just, re-
fined, and good was connected, even super-
human intelligence, dignity, and power. The
artists in picturing him labored to blend the
greatest beneficence and goodness with the
greatest strength and majesty. And such is
die description of the divine Hero of this
Psalm.

According to the myths, Cheiron was the
great teacher of mankind in heavenly wis-
dom, medicine, music, and all noble and po-
lite arts, and from whom the most exalted
heroes and the most honored of men received
their tuition. And so it is said of this sub-
lime King that every grace was poured upon
His lips, and that He is the One specially
blessed of God, whose name every genera-
tion shall remember, and whom the people
shall praise for ever and ever. The barbed
arrows of this Archer are aimed at the heart
of the Scorpion. It was sung of Cheiron,

" 'Midst golden stars he stands refulgent now,
And thrusts the scorpion with his bended bow."

And thus the "arrows" of the divine Hero
of the text "are sharp in the heart of the
King's enemies." His war is with the whole
Serpent-brood, and His going forth is for

142 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

their destruction. Whether we understand
it of the moral and renovating power of the
Gospel, or of the judicial administrations of
the Son of man at the end of the present
Gospel dispensation, or more naturally of
both, it is the office and purpose in all the
doings of the glorified Christ to pierce and
wound the Serpent, to destroy all his works
and power, and to disable him for ever. And
this is shown in the sign, just as it is declared
in the Gospel.

Some of the names in the sign express the
further idea of graciousness and delight in
connection with the action signified ; which
again accords with that saying ascribed to
Christ in both Testaments : " Lo, I come : in
the volume of the book it is written of me.
I delight to do thy will, O my God : yea, thy
law is within my heart. I have preached
righteousness in the great congregation : 1c,
I have not refrained my lips."

Swiftness is another idea included in these
names ; and hence of quick and resistless
power, of which horses and horsemen are the
biblical images, particularly in connection with
the scenes of the great judgment which Christ
is appointed to enact. And the coming again
of Christ is everywhere described as bein<>-

THE SIGN OF SAGITTARIUS. 1 43

with great power and glory, quickly, suddenly,
like the lightning's flash. His own word is,
" Behold, I come quickly ; and my reward is
with me;" "The great day of the Lord hast-
eth greatly ;" " For when they shall say, Peace,
peace ; then sudden destruction cometh upon
them."

Cheiron is sometimes represented as occu-
pying Apollo's throne; and so the word to
this royal Judge and invincible Warrior is,
" Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever ;
the sceptre of Thy kingdom is a right sceptre."
In the Indian sacred books there is a tenth
avatar predicted, when Vishnu, the second in
the divine Triad, is to come as a man on a
white horse, overthrowing his enemies and
rooting out all evil from the earth. And so,
according to the last book of the New Testa-
ment, when the King of kings and Lord of
lords comes forth to the battle of that great
day to overwhelm the Beast and the false
Prophet and all their armies, He comes in
the form of a man sitting upon a white horse,
in righteousness judging and making war, the
same as in Sagittarius.

Thus everything in and illustrative of this
sign serves to identify it as a pictorial proph-
ecy of our blessed Lord, answering in all re-

144 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

spects to the representations given in the
Scriptures. Grotesque and unevangelic as
it may seem, it is a showing upon the stars of
the same things, under the same images, that
we find written concerning the glorified Re-
deemer in whom all our hopes are centred.
He is the sublime Lord and King of salva-
tion, with the two natures in one person, once
humbled to death on the cross, but now ex-
alted to glory in heaven. He is the wise, the
true, the good, the righteous, who standeth
for the defence and administration of right-
eousness against the Devil and all the pow
ers of the Adversary. He is the mighty
Warrior who rideth prosperously, with the
bow and arrows of truth and judgment, ever
aiming and speeding them at the heart of the
foe, and never more giving over until He has
carried everything through to everlasting vic-
tory, when Death and Hades, and all the pow-
ers and children of evil, shall have sunk for
ever to their deserved perdition. And the
Decans in this sign confirm and further illus-
trate what we thus read from it.

The Harp.
In connection with this shooting of the Al-
mighty's arrows against His enemies, when

THE LYRE OF ORPHEUS. 145

His rieht hand shall find them out and His
wrath swallow them up, so that their fruit
shall be destroyed from the earth and their
seed from among the children of men, the
twenty-first Psalm introduces a special cele-
bration of God's exalted strength in the mat-
ter, and represents all His holy ones as sing-
ing and praising His power. So also in the
Apocalyptic visions of the destruction of the
destroyers of the earth, the four-and-twenty
elders in heaven fell upon their faces and
worshipped God, saying, " We give Thee
thanks, O Lord God, the Almighty, who art
and who wast, because Thou hast taken to
Thee Thy great power, and hast reigned" —
i. e. entered on Thy dominion. Accordingly,
also, the first Decan of Sagittarius is the con-
stellation of Lyra, the Lyre, the Harp, marked
by one of the brightest stars in the northern
heavens.

The Lyre of Orpheus.
The harp is the oldest of stringed instru
ments of music. The ancients ascribed its
invention to the gods. We find it named
along with the organ, or shepherd's pipe,
three hundred years before Adam died (Gen.
4: 21), and find a specimen of song to be

13 K

I46 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

sung to it dating back to the same period
(Gen. 4: 23, 24). The most renowned per-
former on the harp or lyre in the classic myths
is Orpheus, often identified with Apollo. He
is called the father of songs and the partic-
ular helper of the Argonauts, the noble ones
seeking for the Golden Fleece. He is not
mentioned by this name by Hesiod or Homer,
and subsequent writers place him far anterior
to Hesiod and Homer, and mention all poets
and singers as his children or the children of
Apollo, to whom he stands in close relation.
His art is everywhere associated with relig-
ion, prayer, prophecy, and all sacred services,
teachings, and anticipations, especially with
the joyous element in holy things. At the
instance of Apollo and the Muses, it is said,
God himself placed the Harp of Orpheus
amone the stars, where it has ever since been
gladdening the celestial sphere with bright-
ness and with song.

The placing of that harp as the first Decan
of Sagittarius connects pre-eminent gladness,
joy, delight and praise with the action of this
great Archer with his bow and arrows. There
is but one such si^n in all the ancient constel-
lations, and that is associated with the going
forth of this double-natured Bowman aiming

THE LYRE OF ORPHEUS. 147

his arrows at the Scorpion's heart. It marks
him in this particular attitude and act as the
achiever of what is the sublimest glory of
God and the sublimest joy of heaven.

People often smile and jest at the fabled
power of the lyre of Orpheus, at which the
rivers for the time forgot to flow, the wild
beasts lost their savageness, the trees and
rocks on Olympus moved from their places
to listen, the ship of the Argonauts glided
smoothly into the sea, the mountains became
entranced, the dragon that oruarded the Gold-
en Fleece sank into sleep, the sufferers in the
under-world for the moment lost their pains,
and all the potencies of hell yielded homage.
But when we connect that lyre with the ac-
tion of this glorious Archer, and take that
action in its true prophetic significance, as
the inventors of these signs intended them,
these smiles and jests subside, and a scene
of glorious achievement opens to our view,
which has been the burden of all the songs
and prayers and hopes and joyful anticipa-
tions of an enthralled and suffering world
from the time that Adam was driven out of
Eden up till then. That glorious Archer, as
he appears in this sign, answers to the Lamb
as John beheld Him, standing, having seven

I48 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

horns and seven eyes — all the fulness of re-
gal, intellectual, and spiritual power and al-
mightiness — and in the act of lifting the title-
deed of the alienated inheritance to take
possession again of all that sin has disponed
away. Heaven contemplated that act with
awe, and grew breathless as it gazed, and a
thrill went through the universal heart of
living things. A new song broke forth from
the living- ones and elders around the throne
of Deity, and rolled sublime through all the
heavenly spheres, till afar in the depths of
space the voices of angelic myriads took it
up, and every creature in heaven, and on
earth, and under the earth, and upon the sea,
and all things in these realms, were heard
singing, and saying, " To Him that sitteth
upon the throne, and to the Lamb, be the
blessing, and the honor, and the glory, and
the dominion for the ages of the ages !" And
this is the true lyre of Orpheus — the joy and
gladness and jubilation of the universe at the
fulfilment of the burden of all sacred hope
and prayer embodied in the words, " Thy
kingdom come — Thy will be done on earth as it
is in heaven /" We thus observe a depth, a
splendor, a volume, a pathos, a universality
of sacred ardor and poetic outpouring, as

THE LYRE OF ORPHEUS. 1 49

just as it is tremendous, and to which all the
extravagances of the mythic records do not
reach halfway.

With a wonderful appropriateness, then,
which could hardly have come from the un-
aided powers of man, did the framers of these
constellations select the brightest star in the
northern heavens to represent this harp, and
give to it the name of Vega, which signifies
He shall be exalted, The warrior triumphant —
the very name from which our own word vic-
tory has come — a name which the Apostle
uses in its primeval and true connection
where he challenges Death and Hades, tri-
umphs over them, and cries his glad thanks
" to God who giveth us the victory through
our Lord Jesus Christ."

In some of the old uranographies this con-
stellation is marked by the figure of an eagle
or hawk, the enemy of the serpent, who darts
forth upon his prey from the heavenly heights
with great suddenness and power; and this
eagle is in the attitude of triumph, much as
the Mexican eagle is presented victoriously
grasping the serpent in its claws. It is the
same idea, the triumphant overwhelming of
the enemy. From this many of the modern
atlases represent the figure of this constella-

13*

ISO THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

tion by an eagle holding the harp, or a harp
placed over an eagle, expressing triumphant
song springing from the eagle — that is, from
the vanquisher and destroyer of the serpent.
Whatever the variations of the figure, the
same idea is retained, showing the true inten-
tion in the marking of this constellation, and
the tenacity with which the original thought
has clung to it in all ages and in all nations.
It is the sign of the Serpent ruled, the Enemy
destroyed, the triumphant fulfilment of the
sublimest of hopes and sacred promises.

Ara, the Burning Pyre.
Still further is this signified in the second
Decan, which the Arabs call Al Mugamra,
the completing, the finishing, the making of
an end of what was undertaken. The Hebrew
uses the elements of the same word where it
is said, " The Lord will perfect that which con-
cerneth me" (Ps. 138 : 8). The Greeks call-
ed it Ara, a word which the Latins used to
denote a small elevation of wood, stone, or
earth made for sacred purposes, particularly
for sacrifices ; hence an altar, and also a fu-
neral-pile, whence we have in our charts the
figure of an altar covered with burning fire to
denote this constellation. The Greeks used

THE UNDER-WORLD. 1 5 I

the word ara sometimes in the sense of pray-
er, but more frequently in the sense of an im-
precation, a curse, or the effect of a curse —
bane, ruin, destruction. Personified, it was
the name of the goddess of revenge and de-
struction. In ^Eschylus it is the name of the
actual curse of CEdipus personified. It con-
nects directly with the Hebrew mar a and
aram, which mean a curse, utter destrtiction.

The Under- World.

In the latitudes in which these constellations
were originally formed Ara was on the low-
est horizon of the south. The regions beyond
this were contemplated as the lower regions,
the under-world, the regions of darkness,
" outer darkness ;" just as the regions toward
the north pole are contemplated as the upper
regions, the regions of li^ht and heaven. And,
singularly enough, these ara-fires burn down-
ward, toward the dark and hidden abyss, to-
ward the covered and invisible south pole.
The whole significance of the name and fig-
ure: thus connects with ultimate perdition, the
completed curse, the sending into " the lake
of fire."

In the Zodiac of Dendera the figure is dif-
ferent, but the idea is the same. There we

152 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

have a throned human figure wielding the
flail, the implement of threshing and bruising,
and that figure at the same time set over a
jackal, often identified with the dragon. Here
is the unclean and cunning animal of dark-
ness brought under dominion and judgment,
threshed, bruised, punished. This throned and
threshing figure has a name which signifies
the Coming One, the same as in Scorpio. The
meaning of the sign is therefore plain. The
idea is, victory over the enemy, the thrusting
of him into the regions of darkness, the
threshing and bruising of him beneath the
feet of the conqueror, the beating of him
down into final punishment.

According to the Scriptures, the spoiling
of Satan and his kingdom by the Virgin-born
Son of God is to go on, step after step, to
complete overthrow and final perdition. A
curse was pronounced upon him at the be-
ginning, fore-announcing that his head should
be bruised under the heel of the promised
Seed of the woman. Though a strong man
aimed, a stronger than he was to come upon
him, take from him his armor, and subdue all
things unto himself, spoiling principalities and
powers, triumphing over them. Christ tells
us of "everlasting fire, prepared for the Devi!

THE UNDER-WORLD. 153

and his angels." John, in his vision of what
must shortly come to pass, heard the heavens
resounding" with the song, « Now is come sal-
vation, and strength, and the kingdom of our
God, and the power of His Christ: for the
accuser of our brethren " — " the great Dragon,
that old Serpent" — "is cast down." He also
saw a messenger from heaven laying hold on
the same, binding him and casting him into
the abyss, whence he was finally " cast into
the lake of fire and brimstone," where he
" shall be tormented day and night for ever
and ever." Such is the curse upon the great
Enemy, and the finishing of him as set forth in
the Holy Scriptures. And what we find thus
written in the book is identical with what is
pictured on the heavens in connection with
Sagittarius. To some the idea may seem far-
fetched, and so different from ordinary think-
ing as to be almost absurd ; but let them look
at the facts as they are, and tell us what other
conclusion is possible. What could be more
complete than the correspondence of the two
records ?

The third constellation belonging to the
sign of the Bowman is also very significant
and further determines the meaning- to be as
just expressed.

154 the gospel in the stars.

The Dragon.
One of the most famous mythological cre-
ations in the history of human thought is the
horrid serpentine monster called the dragon.
Together with the serpent, and other things
of the same repulsive and dangerous class,
this is the universal symbol of evil — of some
living power inimical to God and all good,
and the just terror of all men. The Serpent
stands for that form of the Evil One in which
cunning, artifice, deceit, and malignant sub-
tlety are the characteristics. The Dragon
represents the same power armed, defiant,
and putting forth in imperial forms, and de-
vastating by force. The Serpent is the sly
and creeping deceiver, smoothly gliding in to
betray, insinuating his poison and destroy-
ing by stealth. The Dragon is the terrific
oppressor, assailing with teeth and claws,
armed all over with spikes, lifting speary
wings and tail, spouting fire and fury, and
rushing upon its prey with every vehemence
of malignant energy. The Serpent and the
Dragon are one and the same, only in differ-
ent modes of manifestation. Hence the Dev-
il is called " the Dragon, that old Serpent."
Whenever the power of evil is clothed in po-

THE DRAGON. 155

litical sovereignty, persecuting, tyrannizing,
and oppressing, it is always the Dragon, or
some rampant figure of destruction answer-
ing to it.

Amonor all nations we find this terrible im-
age. Chinese and Japanese legend and art
superabound with it. The pages of the clas-
sic poets of Greece and Rome teem with it
We find it in the religious books, traditions,
and ideas of men of all classes, in all sections
of the world, in all the ages. It is in the Old
Testament, in the Apocrypha, and in the New
Testament. Jews and Gentiles, Christians
and heathen, civilized and savage, the Teu-
tons, Scandinavians, and Celts of Europe, as
well as the myriads of Asia and the remotest
isles of the sea, alike have it, and connect
with it the same family of ideas. And every-
where the vanquishing of this monster is the
work of gods, heroes, and saints.

Many have wondered and speculated as to
how such an imaeination obtained this uni-
versal hold of the human mind. There is
nothing in earthly zoology to serve as the
original for the picture, or to account for con-
ceptions and ideas so uniform all the world
over. No man ever saw a dragon, living or
dead, yet all men talk of the dragon, and adopt

1 56 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

it into all their religion, heraldry, and art as
the symbol of some well-known reality. Where
did it come from ? Admit the doctrine which
lam endeavoring to elucidate respecting these
primeval constellations, and the whole thing
is at once and completely explained as noth-
ing else can explain it. Here is the Serpent
in all forms of manifestation, and particu-
larly the Dragon, wound about at least one-
half of the northern sky, his tail alone ex-
tending over the territory of " the third part
of the stars." Here is the divine Hero,
armed with bow and arrows, riding like St.
George, and aiming his weapons at the heart
of that Dragon's representative. Here is
this precise symbol of the evil power in all
his various shapes and attributes, and the
great Son of the virgin revealed for his de-
struction, and going forth in His benevolent
majesty to make an utter end of the terrible
beast. In all the acres has this imacre been
before the eyes of men in the primeval as-
tronomy, pictorially portraying in the stars
the very ideas that figure so conspicuously in
their myths and traditions. And this, and
this only, is the true original of all these
ethnic conceptions — the true original by in-
spiration given.

THE DRAGON. 1 57

And as Sagittarius goes forth in war against
the enemy to complete upon him the curse,
to make all clear and unmistakable the great
constellation of the Dragon is added as a
third explanatory side-piece, denoting exactly
who it is that this mighty administration strikes,
thus waking all the triumphant songs of heav-
en. It is the final fall of the Dragon-power
before the arrows of the invincible warrior-
Seed of the woman. It is the ultimate victory
fore-announced.

In the Apocalyptic visions of the consum-
mation John beheld a great red Dragon, hav-
ing seven heads and ten horns, upon his head
seven diadems, whose tail was drawing along
the third of the stars of the heaven. He
stood before the woman eager to devour her
child as soon as born ; but in spite of him
that child was caught away to God and to His
throne. And then came war in heaven : Mi-
chael and his angels warring with the Dragon,
who was cast down, and all his angels with
him. And then it was that the great voice
of song was heard in heaven, because the
Accuser, the great Adversary, was conquered
and cast down. For a while his persecutions
continued upon the earth, till the crowned
Warrior on the white horse came, destroying

14

158 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

his armies, chaining him in the abyss for a
thousand years, and then consigning him and
all his to the lake of fire, whence the smoke
of their torment ascendeth up for ever and
ever (Rev. 12 : 19, 20).

Thus also the Psalmist sings : " God is my
King of old, working salvation in the midst
of the earth, breaking the heads of the drag-
ons in the waters, breaking the heads of Le-
viathan in pieces" (Ps. 74).

Isaiah refers exultingly to the time when
the Lord cometh forth out of His place to
punish the workers of iniquity, and says : " In
that day the Lord with His sore and great and
strong sword shall punish Leviathan the cross-
ing serpent, even Leviathan that crooked ser-
pent; and He shall slay the Dragon;" and
calls upon all the people of God to sing when
that day arrives (Isa. 26 : 27).

And when we lay these foreshowings of
the holy prophets alongside of these pictures
in the stars, who can question that we have
one and the same story in both ? In both we
behold the same Dragon, the same worming
of himself into the domain of God, the same
spoliation of peace and good by his malignant
power, and the same vastness and stretch of
his evil influences and dominion. In both we

THE DRAGON. 1 59

have the same divine Hero, arrayed as an
invincible warrior, going forth in conquer-
ing majesty against the Dragon, wounding
him with His arrows, cleaving him with His
sword, bruising and crushing him for his
wickedness, annihilating his power, and con-
signing^ him to his deserved and everlastine
perdition. The names, the actions, the im-
plements, the results, and the common joy
of the holy universe over the achievement,
are one and the same in the constellations, in
the Scriptures, and in the myths. Nor could
all this possibly have been except from one
original source, even the sacred promise and
foreshowing of God, variously certified, and
ever again repeated through His prophets,
even from the foundations of the world.

The name of this great constellation is
Draco, the Dragon, the trodden-on. The
chief star has several ancient names, such
as Al Waid, who is to be destroyed ; Thuban,
the subtle ; Al Did, the reptile. This was the
pole-star from four to six thousand years ago,
singularly answering to the scriptural desig-
nation of Satan as the god and prince of this
world. To this day this star is still observed
as a very important star to nautical men and
the direction of commerce upon the seas, just

l6o THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

as the Dragon power still largely prevails,
The second star in this constellation is Rasta-
ban, head of the subtle ; the third, Etanin, the
long serpent, the Dragon ; another, Grumian,
the deceiver ; another, El Atkik, the fraudful ;
another, El Asieh, the humbled, brought down ;
another, Gianser, the punished enemy. Roots
corresponding to all these words are contain-
ed in the Hebrew Scriptures, where they are
used in the senses here given.

What shall we say, then, to these things ?
Mythology says the Dragon is the power that
guarded the golden apples in the famous
Garden of the Hesperides, hindering men
from getting them. Is not this the Devil, the
old Serpent, the Dragon, who has thrust him-
self in to keep mortal men from the fruits of
the Tree of Life ? Mythology says this Drag-
on was slain by Hercules. And is not Her-
cules the astronomic sign of the promised
Seed of the woman, the One to come as the
Serpent-bruiser, and who stands pictured in
his constellation with His foot on the head of
the Dragon? Other myths represent the
Dragon as guarding the sacred well, and
slaying those who came to draw from it, but
was slain by the arrows of Cadmus, who had
to suffer for it, indeed, but by Minerva's aid

CADMUS. l6l

freed the way to the well, and built there a
noble city. But is not Cadmus the hero sent
to seek his sister who was lost, and the same
who was offered as the giver of victory to the
people who should accept him as their com-
mander ; just as Christ is come to seek and
to save that which was lost, through suffering
and divinity vanquishing Satan, opening access
to the sacred well of the waters of life, build-
ing: about it the Zion of His Church, and con-
ductinor those who take Him as their Lord and
King to the blessedness of triumph and ever-
lasting peace ? Ay, verily, these signs in the
constellations are but another version of what
was written by the prophets and set forth in
the Scriptures as the true and only hope of
man.

" Most wondrous Book ! The Author God himself;
The subject, God and man, salvation, life
And death — eternal life, eternal death.

. . . On every line
Marked with the seal of high divinity,
On every leaf bedewed with drops of love
Divine, and with the eternal heraldry
And signature of God Almighty stamped
From first to last."
14 • L

ILecture JDCbnitlj.

DEATH AND NEW LIFE.

John 12 : 24: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn oi
wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone : but if it die, it
bringeth forth much fruit."

IN connection with these words I continue
the study of that evangelic record which
we find written on the stars in the ancient
astronomy.

As far as we have gone in these investiga-
tions, four signs of the Zodiac, with their ac-
companying Decans, have been discussed —
Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, and Sagittarius. Eight
more of these signs accordingly remain to be
considered; and to these, in their order, I
propose that we now direct our attention.

Order of the Signs,
Perhaps this is as good a place as any that
may offer to remark the fact that these twelve
siens of the Solar Zodiac divide themselves
into three distinct groups, each group having
its own distinct subject. The first group,

162

THE SIGN OE CAPR1C0RXUS. 1 63

consisting of the four si<*ns which have al-
ready been before us, relates to the Person.
Work, and Triumph of the illustrious Re-
deemer, with special reference to himself.
The next succeeding group, consisting of
Capricornus, Aquarius, Pisces, and Aries, with
their several Decans, relates to the Fruits of
His Work and Mediatorship — the formation,
condition, and destiny of the Church, or that
body of people spiritually born to Him through
faith, and made partakers of the benefits of
His redemptive administrations ; whilst the
third and last group relates to the final Con-
summation of the whole in the united glory
of the Redeemer and the redeemed, and the
exalted condition of things which the Con-
summation is to realize. All this will be more
clearly brought out as we proceed. At pres-
ent we make our entrance upon the second
or middle group.

The Sign of Capricornus.

Here we have the picture of a fallen goat
with the vigorous tail of a fish — half goat and
half fish.

It may seem singular and far-fetched to
connect the text I have read with such a figure.
A little consideration, however, will show that

164 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

the subject-matter in both is in fact identical,
though the particular imagery is entirely dif-
ferent. That of the text is the image which
we had in Virgo, where the illustrious Son
of the virgin is likened to a grain of corn or
seed, denoted by Spica, the ear of wheat. It
was necessary for this seed or grain of wheat
to fall into the ground and die in order to
reach its intended fruitfulness, which fruitful-
ness arises directly out of such falling and
dying. The meaning of the passage is, that
Christ was to die as a sacrifice, and that by
virtue of His sacrificial death salvation was to
come to man and the congregation of saved
ones formed. As Wordsworth expresses it,
" He compares himself to a grain of corn,
which would be buried by the unbelief of the
Jews, but would fructify in the faith of the
Gentiles. As much as to say, I will die, that
they may live. My death will be their birth!'
As the phcenix was said to arise out of the
ashes of its consumed predecessor, so the
Church, or congregation of saints, rises out
of the death of Christ, sacrificed for the sins
of the world. This is everywhere the teach-
ing of the Scriptures, and nowhere more
pointedly and graphically than in this text.
And when we translate this idea into the im-

TYPE AND ANTITYPE. 1 65

agery of the fifth sign of the Zodiac, we find
another very graphic and much older picture
of precisely the same thing.

Type and Antitype.

First of all, we have here the figure of a goat.
This is a sacrificial animal. God commanded
the children of Israel, saying, " Take ye a kid
of the goats for a sin-offering" (Lev. 9 : 31).
So Aaron " took the goat, which was the sin-
offering for the people, and slew it, and of-
fered it for sin" (Lev. 9: 15). And of the
goat of the sin-offering Moses said, "It is
most holy, and God hath given it you to bear
the iniquity of the congregation, to make
atonement for them before the Lord" (Lev.
10 : 16, 17).

In the next place, this goat is fallen down
in the attitude of dying. His one leg is
doubled under his body, and the other is pow-
erless to lift him up. His head is drooping
and sinking in death. This is the identical
falling and dying of Christ as the sin-offering
to which He refers in the text. It is the same
Seed of the woman, in the attitude and con-
dition of a sacrifice for sin. Christ surely
was "wounded for our transgressions" and
"bruised for our iniquities." "He was cut

1 66 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

off out of the land of the living: for the
transgression of my people was He stricken."
As the Head of the flock He suffered in their
stead, and laid down His life in sacrifice that
they might live. And here it is written on
the stars from the earliest ages, and with a
vividness of pictorial representation which
no one can contemplate without realizing that
the picture is intensely striking.

The names in this sign also point to the
same thought and significance. Gedi and
Dabih are the most prominent stars in this
constellation ; and in Hebrew, Arabic, and Syr-
iac these names mean, the cut-off, the Jzewn-
down, the sacrifice slain. Other stars in the
same constellation have names of similar im-
port, signifying the slaying, the record of the
cutting off. Even the elements of the name
of the sign as we still have it from the Latins,
Cap7acomus, mean not only the goat, but
atonement, sinking or bowed in death. And
if there is any significance whatever in these
celestial pictures, we have in this sign the
symbol of sacrificial death, which is the exact
idea of the text.

The Church.
But it is at the same time a picture of an-

THE CHURCH. 1 67

other kind of life, developed out of this sac-
rificial death, and vitally conjoined with it.
The body of the fallen and dying goat ter-
minates in the body and tail of a vigorous
fish. The living fish thus takes its being out
of the dying goat, and has all its life and
vigor from thence. Accordingly, the Coptic
name of this sien signifies the station or man-
sion of bearing. In addition to the falling and
dying, it is the sign of a mystic procreation
and bringing forth. That which is brought
forth is a fish, which is again a familiar and
well-understood sacred symbol.

When Jesus called and appointed His first
ministers He said, " I will make you fishers
of men" (Matt. 4:19). So when God said
He will bring the children of Israel again into
their own land, His word was, " I will send
for many fishers, and they shall fish them"
(}er. 16: 15, 16). So in Ezekiel's vision of
the holy waters the word was, " And there
shall be a very great multitude of fish, because
these waters shall come thither" (Ez. 47 : 1-9).
Christ speaks of His saved ones as "bom of
water" (John 3:5). In the parable of the
drag-net and in the miraculous draughts of
fishes God's people are contemplated asfis/ies.
Henrc:. in both Testaments fishes stand as the

1 68 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

symbol of believers. "Fishes signify regen-
erate persons," says Dr. Gill. " Fish are
those that are wrought upon and brought in
by the Gospel, and are so called for six rea-
sons," says Greenhill. " Fish are the men
who have attained to life by the Messianic
salvation," says Dr. Hengstenberg. The
early Christians were accustomed to call be-
lievers Ichthues and Pisces — that is, fishes. In
the name and titles of our Lord — " Jesus
Christ, the Son of God, our Saviour'' — the in-
itials in Greek form a word or name which
signifies a fish, and hence the Fathers techni-
cally designated Christ as the mystic divine
Fish, who in the waters of baptism begets
the multitude of fishes — the congregation of
His people. Christ is therefore at once the
sacrificial goat of the sin-offering and the be-
getter of a body of reborn men, the Church,
the congregation of the quickened and saved.
The diction of the Scriptures thus answers
exactly to the figure in this sign, which is the
dying goat developed into a fish body.

The Mystical Union.
Even the great New-Testament doctrine
of the Mystical Union of believers with their
Saviour is here most strikingly signified. As

THE MYSTICAL UNION. 1 69

men naturally are but reproductions and per-
petuations of Adam, and live his life, so
Christ's people are the reproduction and per-
petuation of Christ, living His life. They
are in Him as the branch is in the vine.
They are repeatedly called His body, one
with Him, " members of His body and of
His flesh and of His bones." And so close
and real is their life-connection and incorpo-
ration with Him that they are in a sense
sometimes called " Christ." What, then,
could better symbolize this than the sign be-
fore us ? This goat and fish are one — one
being, the life of the dying reproduced and
continued in a spiritual product which is part
of one and the same body* The goat of sac-
rifice sinks into a new creation, which is yet
an organic part of itself. The image is gro-
tesque, and has no prototype in Nature, but
it is true, exact and graphic. The forgive-
ness and regeneration of men, and their in-
corporation with Christ, is something wholly
above Nature — something altogether mirac-
ulous— which could not be adequately signi-
fied by any natural symbols ; and so, as the
double nature of the Redeemer himself was
denoted by an arbitrary figure, half horse and.
half man, so the relation between Him as the
15

I70 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Sin-bearer and His saved people, who live
by virtue of His death, is denoted by another
arbitrary figure, made up of a dying goat and
a living fish. Nor is it in the power of hu-
man genius or imagination to devise another
figure capable of setting forth more simply
and truly the great and glorious mystery.

The Myths.
The pagan myths concerning this sign cor-
respond with these interpretations. This goat
is everywhere regarded as Pan, Bacchus, or
some divine personage. How he came to
have the form of a goat is explained after
this fashion : The gods were feasting near a
great river, when suddenly the terrible Ty-
phon came upon them, compelling them to
assume other shapes in order to escape his
fury. Bacchus took the form of a goat and
plunged into the 'river, and that part of his
body which was under the water took the form
of a fish. To commemorate the occurrence
Jupiter placed him in the heavens in his met-
amorphosed shape. The story is absurd, but
through it shines something of the great orig-
inal idea. It was to secure deliverance from
the fury of God's wrath upon sin, and from
the ruinous power of the Devil, that the Son

THE MYTHS. 171

of God took upon Him the form of a Sin-
bearer and Sacrifice, and in this character was
plunged into the deep waters of death. It
was by His taking of this form, and His sink-
ing in death as our substitute and propitiation,
that life came to those who were under the
power of death, whereby they became a liv-
ing part of Him, never more to be separated
from Him. The myth is only a paganized
and corrupted paraphrase of the original
reference which the Spirit of sacred proph-
ecy had written in the primeval astronomy,
whence the whole conception originated.

Da^on, the half-fish crod of the Philistines,
and Oannes, the half-fish god of the Babylo-
nians, also connect with this Zodiacal Capri-
cornus, and have embodied in them the same
original thought as well as figure. Philo tells
us that Dagon means fruitf illness, the seed-pro-
ducing ; and so Christ is the Seed, the Corn
of wheat, fallen and dying in the goat, but
producing the living fish, the Church, which
is the travail of His soul, the true fruit of
His atonement. Eusebius says that Dagon
was the god of husbandry, the god of seeds
and harvests. Pluche says that Dagon among
the Philistines was the same as Horus among
the Egyptians ; and Horus takes the charac-

172 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ter of the meek and silent Sufferer from whom
comes the horn of blessing and plenty. Dag-
on had the human form in place of the goat,
but that was only a further interpretation of
the meaning ; for the goat part of Capri-
cornus stands for the Seed of the woman, and
so is in reality the man Christ Jesus.

Berosus speaks of Oannes as likewise half
man and half fish. Some of the ancient pic-
tures of him still remain, in which he is fig-
ured as a great fish outside, but under and
within the fish, and joined with it as its more
vital interior, was a tall and vigorous man,
standing upright in great dignity, with one
hand lifted up as if calling for attention, and
in the other carrying a basket or satchel as if
filled with treasure. He is fabled as having
risen out of the sea to teach the primitive
Babylonians the secrets of wisdom, particu-
larly the elements of culture, civilization, and
law, organizing them into a prosperous com-
monwealth. An ancient fragment says of
him : " He grew not old in wisdom, and the
wise people with his wisdom he filled." The
representation is throughout in full accord
with what I have been saying of Capricornus.
There is a coming up out of the deep in
glorious life, and a blessed fruitfulness brought

SPIRITUAL CONCEPTIONS 1 73

forth thereby, and that fruitfulness in the form
of instructed, wise, and disciplined people. It
is the fallen Seed of the woman risen up from
death after having gone down into the invis-
ible and unknown world, begetting and cre-
ating a new order among men — the dying
Seed issuing in the believing body, the Church,
in which He still lives and walks and teaches
and blesses. The myth embodies the exact
story of the sign.

Spiritual Conceptions.
Moreover, the very complexity of the figure
of Capricornus, at first so confusing and hard
to construe, conducts us into still further par-
ticularities of evangelic truth. As far as we
have been looking at it, we see the literal
death of one being issuing in the spiritual life
of other beings, of whose new life He is the
life. It is Christ in the one case corporeally
sacrificed, and His people mystically resurrect-
ed to newness of life in the other. But along
with this goes a reflex which it is important
for us to observe, as it brines out some of the
deep practical spiritualities of true religion.
Of course, the rising of the fishes out of the
dying goat implies the literal and potent res-
urrection of Christ himself as the Begetter

15*

1/4 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

and Giver of this spiritual resurrection to His
people ; for if He did not rise, then no preach-
ing or believing would avail to bring us to life
or salvation. But as we rise to spiritual life
through the power of His resurrection, so
there is also implied a dying with Him in or-
der to rise with Him; for there is no resurrec-
tion where there has been no dying. We look
for a resurrection of the body, because there
is first a death of the body. And as God's
people are partakers of a mystic or spiritual
resurrection, there goes before it a correspond-
ing death. That death out of which their new
life comes through and in Christ is twofold.
It is first a deadness in sin — existence indeed,
but morally and spiritually a mere carcass,
with no life-standing to the law or any practi-
cal spiritual life toward God and heaven — a
life that is nothing but spiritual death and cor-
ruption under sentence of eternal death. In
the next place, it is death to sin, both as to its
penalty and power, a cessation of the mere
carnal life and of further existence under con-
demnation. Now, the great office of religion,
through the Seed of the woman and His sac-
rificial offering of himself to expiate our sins,
is to bring death to this old life in sin and
death, and by this wounding, slaying and put-

SPIRITUAL CONCEPTIONS. 1 75

ting- off of the old man of corruption, to gen-
erate, evolve, sustain, teach and train the new
man, which is renewed after the image of
Christ's own resurrection, and which beams
with better knowledge and true holiness.
Christ corporeally dies for us, and we mysti-
cally die to the old death-life with, in, and by
virtue of Him. We die to the death-penalty
which holds us whilst in the mere carnal life,
and put it clean off from us for ever, in the
atoning sacrifice of Christ, by accepting Him
and believing in Him as our Surety and Pro-
pitiation ; and in really taking Him as our
Redeemer and Hope there is such a force in
our faith, and it is in itself such a living and
active power, that in the very exercise of it
we necessarily die to the pursuit and service
of sin. In other words, beginning to live in
Christ, we begin to die to the old carnal life.
The one is the correlative of the other. Hence
the apostolic word : " How shall we that are
dead to sin live any longer therein ? Know
ye not that so many of us as were baptized
into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death?
Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism
into death; that like as Christ was raised up
from the dead by the glory of the Father,
even so we also should walk in newness of

176 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

life, . . . knowing this, that our old man is
crucified with Him, that the body of sin might
be destroyed, that henceforth we should not
serve sin. For he that is dead is freed from
sin " (Rom. 6 : 2-7).

This, then, is the meaning of the picture :
The Seed of the woman takes our death-pen-
alty on himself, and dies a sacrifice for our
sins, so that believers die with Him to all the
old life of condemnation and sin ; out of this
death He springs up in resurrection-power,
in which believers rise with Him by being
brought to know and accept the truth and to
follow His teachings in lively hope of a still
further rising in immortal glory at the last ;
in all of which we behold the much fruit yield-
ed by the seed of wheat falling to the ground
and dying.

And with these presentations agree the ac-
companying side-pieces or Decans.

The Arrow.
The first is Sagitta, the shot and killing
arrow. It appears naked and alone. It has
left the bow, and is speeding to its aim. It is
a heavenly arrow, and He who shoots it is
invisible. There is a majesty and a mystery
about it which startles and awes. It is the

THE ARROW. IJJ

death-arrow of almighty justice, which goes
forth from the throne against all unrighteous-
ness and sin. It is that death-inflicting instru-
ment which comes with resistless force and
sharpness against a world that lieth in sin,
and which pierces the spotless Son of God
as found in the place of guilty and condemned
man. The execution it does is shown in the
fallen and dying goat. It is the arrow of di-
vine justice and condemnation upon sin pier-
cing through the body and soul of the meek
Lamb of God, who agreed to bear our sins
and answer for them.

In the thirty-eighth Psalm we have this very
arrow of God sticking fast in the body of the
mysterious Sufferer, wounding His flesh and
His bones, and completely overwhelming
Him. He is troubled and bowed down, as
under a crushing burden. His heart panteth,
his strength faileth, the light of his eyes fades
out. Not only is he the persecuted object of
man's hatred, but shut up within the strong
bars of divine judgment. It was divine grace
that prepared and shot that arrow against the
person of the blameless One ; but, being found
in the room and stead of sinners, God's holy
vengeance could not hold back for the sparing
even of the only-begotten of the Father, so

M

jyS THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

full of grace and truth. Christ came into the
world to die for it ; and toward this lowest
deep His steps daily led Him as He looked
onward to the harvest that was being sown
amid these tears. It would seem almost as
if the song of the Psalmist had been copied
direct from what is thus pictured in these
signs.

But this Arrow doubtless covers a further
idea. There is a spiritual piercing and slay-
ing in the case of those who come to new life
in Christ, akin to the piercing and slaying of
Christ himself. Sharp and hurtful words are
compared to arrows. And of this character
are the words of God as pronounced upon the
wicked, judging and condemning them for
their sins, bringing them down from their
lofty self-security, and killing out of them
the vain imaginings in which they live. Isaiah
speaks of this sort of shaft or arrow in the
Lord's quiver — the arrow of the Word — the
arrow of conviction of sin, righteousness, and
judgment — a wounding and killing arrow
wnich enters into men's souls, and makes
humble penitents of them, that they may
come to life in Christ. The death of Christ
for our sins also takes the form of a word,
preaching, testimony, and argument, even the

THE PIERCED EAGLE. 179

preaching of the Cross, to kill the life of sin
and to cause men to die unto it; so that the
very arrow of sovereign justice which drank
up the life of Christ as our Substitute and
Propitiation passes through Him to pierce
also those whose life in sin cost Him all this
humiliation and pain ; also killing them to that
ill and condemned life that they may live the
Christ-life as His renewed, justified, and re-
deemed children.

Thus the Arrow fills out precisely the same
ideas which we find symbolized in the sign of
Capricornus.

The Pierced Eagle.
The second Decan adds still further to the
clearness and certainty of the meaning. This
is the constellation of Aquila, the pierced,
wounded, and falling eagle. It is but another
picture of the grain of wheat falling and dy-
ing. The principal star in this constellation
is of the first magnitude, and is the star by
which the position of the moon — also a symbol
of the Church — is noted for the computation
of loneitude at sea. Its name is Al Tair,
which in Arabic means the wounded. The
name of the second star in the same language
means the scarlet-colored — covered with blood.

180 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

The name of the third means the to?my whilst
that of another means the wounded in the heel.
It is simply impossible to explain how all these
names got into this sign and its Decans, ex-
cept by intention to denote the great fact of
the promised Saviour's death.

The myths explain this eagle in different
ways. Some say it is Merops, king of Cos,
the husband of Ethemea, who lamented for
his condemned wife, and was transformed
into an eagle and placed among the stars.
Some say it is the form assumed by Jupiter
in carrying off Ganymedes, whilst others de-
scribe it as the eagle which brought nectar to
Jupiter while he lay concealed in the Cretan
cave by reason of the fury and wrath of Sat-
urn. In short, pagan wisdom did not know
what it meant, though holding it in marked
regard. And yet, as Christ loved the Church,
and gave himself for it, and reigns in glory
for its good — as He humbled himself in obe-
dience to death that He might take to him-
self a glorious Church to serve the eternal
Father in immortal blessedness — as He was
really brought down into the cave of death,
whence He was revived by heavenly virtues
after the exhaustion of the fierce wrath of in-
sulted sovereignty, — we can still see some dim

THE PIERCED EAGLE. l8l

reflections of the original truth and meaning
even in these confused and contradictory
fables.

The eagle is one of the biblical symbols of
Christ. "Ye have seen what I did unto the
Egyptians, and how / bare you on eagles wings
and brought you unto myself" (Ex. 19:4),
" As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth
over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings,
taketh them, beareth them on her wings ; so
the Lord alone did lead him" (Deut. 32 : 11,
12). The eagle is a royal bird, and the nat-
ural enemy of the serpent. It is elevated in
its habits, strong, and swift. It is very careful
and tender toward its young, and is said to
tear itself to nourish them with its own blood
when all other means fail. And here is the
noble Eagle, the promised Seed of the wo-
man, pierced, torn, and bleeding, that those
begotten in His image may be saved from
death, sheltered, protected, and made to live
for ever.

But, as in the case of the Arrow, so also
in this case, the figure will admit the further
idea which takes in the proud sinner, pierced
by the arrow of the Word and brought down
into the humiliation of penitence, even to death
and despair as to all his former hopes in him-

16

1 82 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

self. And until the high-soaring children of
pride are thus brought down by the arrow of
God's Word, and fall completely out of the
heaven of their dreams, conformably to Christ's
death for them, there can come to them no
right life. Paul was alive without the law
once, and a very high-soaring and bloodthirsty
eagle ; but when the commandment came, sin
revived, and he died — died the death that could
alone bring him to right life.

The Dolphin.
The third Decan of this si^n is the beauti-
ful cluster of little stars named DelpJiinus.
It is the figure of a vigorous fish leaping up-
ward. Taken in connection with the dying
goat, it conveys the idea of springing up
again out of death. Our great Sin-bearer
not only died for our sins, but He also rose
again, thereby becoming "the first-fruits of
them that slept." As the Head and Repre-
sentative of His Church, He is the principal
Fish in the congregation of the fishes. Their
quickening, life, and spiritual resurrection rest
on His coming forth again after having gone
down into the waves of death for their sakes.
Put to death in the flesh, He was quickened
by the Spirit, and in His quickening and res-

THE DOLPHIN. 1 83

urrection all His people share. Their sins
having been buried in His death, their life is
by virtue of His resurrection, that "like as
He was raised from the dead, so we should
walk in newness of life," ever advancing to-
ward a still more complete resurrection to
come. The corn of wheat falls into the ground
and dies, but from that death there is a spring-
ing up again to the intended fruitfulness.
Christ dies and rises again, and His people,
slain in their old carnal confidence, absolved
by His suffering of the penalty due to them,
and planting themselves solely upon Him as
their Lord and Redeemer, rise with him into
the new, spiritual, and eternal life. The pic-
ture of the dying goat, with its after-part a
living fish, implied this, but the nature of the
transition could not be so well expressed in
that figure by itself. Hence the additional
explanatory figure of an upspringing fish, to
show more vividly that the transition is by
means of resurrection to a new life of anoth-
er style. We thus have the vivid symbol of
both the resurrection of the slain Saviour as
the Head of the Church, and the included
new creation of His people, who rise to their
new life through His death and resurrection.
In ancient mythology the dolphin was the

1 84 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

most sacred and honored of fishes, doubtless
because of its place among the ancient con-
stellations, though the myths representing it
are very different. It was specially sacred to
Apollo, and its name was added to his — some
say, because he slew the dragon ; others say,
because in the form of a dolphin he showed
the Cretan colonists the way to Delphi, the
most celebrated place in the Grecian world
and the seat of the most famous of all the
oracles. According to some accounts, it was a
dolphin which brought about the marriage of
the unwilling Amphitrite with the god of the
sea, and for this it received place among the
stars. The muddy waters reflect something
of the original idea. Christ was the true Son
of Deity. It was He who broke the Dragon's
power by submitting to become the atoning
Mediator. " In all things it behoved Him to
be made like unto His brethren, that He
might be a merciful and faithful high priest
to make reconciliation for the sins of the peo-
ple." By His death and resurrection He has
opened and shown the way by which His peo-
ple come to the blessed city of which Jehovah
is the light. By His mediation He has brought
about a marriage between men in flight from
their Lord and Him who loved them with a

SA L VA TION THR O UGH A TONE ME NT. 1 8 5

love that passeth knowledge. And in believ-
ing foretoken of all this His sign, as the Head
of His people, was thus placed in the heavens,
where it stands as another form of the parable
of the buried corn of wheat rising in new life,
of which all who are His are partakers.

Salvation through Atonement.
Capricornus is thus the illustrious bearer
and witness of the most vital evangelical
truths. There is no more central or import-
ant doctrine of our holy faith than this, that
the pure and sinless Son of God, having as-
sumed our nature for the purpose, did really
and truly take the sins of the world upon
Him, and bore the agonies of an accursed
death as the sacrifice and propitiation for our
guilt. Whatever difficulty human reason may
have in receiving it, it is the very heart and
substance of the Gospel tidings, on which all
the hopes of fallen man repose. " Thus it is
written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer,
and to rise from the dead the third day, that
repentance and remission of sins might be
preached in His name" (Luke 24:46, 47).
This " first of all " Paul preached, and Chris-
tians received and held, " how that Christ died
for our sins according to the Scriptures, and

1 86 THE GOSPEL IX THE STARS.

that He was buried, and that He rose again
the third day according to the Scriptures "
(i Cor. 15 : 3, 4). "Forasmuch as the chil-
dren are partakers of flesh and blood. He also
himself likewise took part of the same, that
through death He might destroy him that had
the power of death, that is, the Devil, and de-
liver them who through fear of death were all
their lifetime subject to bondage " (Heb. 2 :
14, 15). Hence the highest apostolic song on
earth is that led off by the holy seer of Pat-
mos : "Unto Him that loved us, and washed
us from our sins in His own blood, and hath
made us kings and priests unto God and His
Father; to Him be glory and dominion for
ever and ever ;" whilst the saints in heaven,
in devoutest adoration, fall down before the
Lamb, and cry, " Thou art worthy to take the
book, and to open the seals thereof ; for Thou
wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by Thy
blood" (Rev. 1 : 5, 6 ; 5:9).

And how cheering and confirmatory to our
faith to see and know that what Prophets and
Apostles have been testifying on earth the
heavens themselves have been proclaiming
for all these aees ! How assuring to know
that what we build our hope on now is the
same that the holy patriarchs from Adam's

SA L VA T10N THR O UGH A TONE ME NT. I $7

time built on as their hope and joy ! They
believed and expected, and hung their faith
and testimony on the stars, that in the fulness
of time the Seed of the woman should come,
and bow himself in death as the Sin-offering
for a guilty world, and rise again in life and
fruitfulness of saving virtues, whereby His
Church should rise with Him, sharing at once
the merit of His atonement and the power of
His resurrection, and thus live and reign in
inseparable union with himself in life and glo-
ry everlasting. Every September midnight
of every year for all these centuries has ac-
cordingly displayed the sign of it in the mid-
dle of the sky, and held it forth to the eyes
of mortals as the blessed hope and only ref-
use of a condemned world, at the same time
that it marks the point of change in year and
climate, and when the darkness is the great-
est opens the southern gateway of the Sun.

Yes, this strange goat-fish, dying in its
head, but living in its after-part — falling as
an eagle pierced and wounded by the arrow
of death, but springing up from the dark
waves with the matchless vigor and beauty
of the dolphin — sinking under sin's condem-
nation, but rising again as sin's conqueror —
developing new life out of death, and herald-

1 88 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ing a new spring-time out of December's
long drear nights — was framed by no blind
chance of man. The story which it tells is
the old, old story on which hangs the only
availing hope that ever came, or ever can
come, to Adam's race. To what it signifies
we are for ever shut up as the only saving
faith. In that dying Seed of the woman we
must see our Sin-bearer and the atonement
for our guilt, or die ourselves unpardoned
and unsanctified. Through His death and
blood-shedding we must find our life, or the
true life, which alone is life, we never can
have.

" The wheaten corn which falls and dies,
In autumn's plenty richly waves ;
So, from the loathsome place of graves,
With Christ, our Elder, we may rise.

" From death comes life ! The hand of God
This direst curse to good transforms ;
So purest air is born of storms ;
So bursts the harvest from the clod."

Uraure (Stgijtfj.

THE LIVING WATERS,

John 7 : 37 : "If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and
drink."

ONE of the gladdest things in our world
is water. In whatever shape it pre-
sents itself, it is full of interest and beauty.
Whether trickling down in pearly mist from
the fragrant distilleries of Nature, or rippling
in merry windings through the grassy dell or
shady grove; whether jetting from the rocky
precipices of the mountain, or gathered into
the rolling plains of ocean ; whether spark-
ling in the ice-gem, or pouring in the cata-
ract ; whether coming in silver drops from
the bow-spanned heavens, or forcing itself
out in glassy purity from the dark veins of
the earth ; whether in the feathery crystals
of the snow-flakes, or grandly moving in the
volume of the ample river, — it is everywhere
and always beautiful. Next to light, it is
God's brightest element ; and liodit itself is
as much at home in it as in its own native

189

190 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

sky. Sometimes, in some connections, it is
the symbol of evil, but even there it is the ex-
pression of life and energy. Nor is it much
to be wondered that in the hot Orient men
were moved to deify fountains and erect vo-
tive temples over them, as though they were
gracious divinities. The preciousness of
bright, fresh waters to parched and needy
man is beyond all compare. Where such
waters come they bring gladness and rejuve-
nation, luxuriousness and plenty. Where
they pour forth, sinking strength recovers,
dying life rekindles, perishing Nature revives,
a thousand delights are awakened, and every-
thing rejoices and sings with new-begotten
life/

Such an object in Nature could not fail to
be seized by the sacred writers to represent
the life-giving purity and regenerating power
of divine grace and salvation. Accordingly,
we find it one of the common and most lively
images under which the Scriptures set forth
the cleansing, renewing, and saving virtues
that come to man in God's redemptive ad-
ministrations. Thus the Spirit in Baalam's
unwilling lips described the goodliness of Is-
rael's tents " as the valleys spread forth, as
gardens by the river's side, as the trees of

THE LIVING WATERS. I9I

lign-aloes which the Lord hath planted, as
cedar trees beside the waters." Thus when
the inspired Moses began his song of God's
grace to Israel's tribes, he said, " My doctrine
shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distil
as the dew, as the small rain upon the tender
herb, and as the showers upon the grass."
The good man is " like a tree planted by the
rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit
in his season, whose leaf also shall not with-
er." The joy of Messiah's day is the open-
ing of u a fountain to the house of David, and
to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and
for uncleanness." Ezekiel beholds the bless-
ed influences of the sanctuary as issuing wa-
ters— waters to the ankles, waters to the
knees, waters to the loins, waters to swim in
— a river of waters. Jesus himself discoursed
to the woman of Samaria of the saving- bene-
fits of His grace as " living water" — water
which slakes all thirst for ever. The people
of God are likened to fishes, whose life-ele
ment is water. And so in the text the Saviour
compares His redeeming virtue and grace to
water, and says, " If any man thirst, let Jdrn
come unto Me, and drink."

In those signs, then, which the primeval pa-
triarchs hung upon the stars as everlasting

192 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

witnesses of God's gracious purposes to be
achieved through the Seed of the woman, we
would certainly expect to find some great
prominence given to this same significant
symbol. And as we would anticipate, so do
we really find, especially in the sixth sign of
the Zodiac, which we now come to consider.

The Sign of Aquarius.
Here is the figure of a man with a great
urn upon his arm, from which he is pouring
out from the heavens a stream of water which
flows with all the volume of a swollen river.
Mythology calls him Ganymedes, the bright,
glorified, and happy One — the Phrygian youth
so beautiful on earth that the great King and
Father of gods carried him away to heaven on
eagles' wings to live in glory with immortals.
Some say that he came to an untimely death in
this world; and the stories in general combine
in representing him as the beloved and favor-
ite of the divine Father, exalted to glory and
made the chosen cup-bearer of the Deity.
Classic art portrays him as a most beautiful
young man, sometimes carried by an eagle,
sometimes ministering drink to an eagle from
a bowl which he bears, and again as the
particular companion of the eternal Father.

THE SIGN OF AQUARIUS. 1 93

Amid all these earthly varnishes which pa-
ganism has daubed over the picture we still
may see the sacred image shining through.
The true Ganymedes is the beautiful Lord
Jesus, "the chief among ten thousand, and
altogether lovely." Cut off was He in His
early manhood, but divinely lifted up again,
Dome away to heaven on unfailing wings,
seated in brightness and glory beside the
everlasting Father, loved and approved as
God's only-begotten Son, made the sovereign
Lord and Dispenser of grace and salvation,
and by His merit procuring and pouring out
the very " river of water of life." The urn
He holds is the exhaustless reservoir of all
the fulness of renewing, comforting, and sanc-
tifying power. And the turning of that holy
urn for its contents to flow down into the
world below is the precise picture of the ful-
filment of those old prophetic promises: "I
will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and
floods upon the dry ground : I will pour out
my Spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing
upon thine offspring;" "I will pour out my
Spirit upon all flesh ; and your sons and your
daughters shall prophesy, and your old men
shall dream dreams, and your young men
shall see visions " (Isa. 44 : 3 ; Joel 2:28).

17 N

194 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

The name of the principal star in this sign
— Set ad al Melik — means Record of the out-
pouring. The Coptic, Greek, and Latin
names of the sign itself signify The Pourei'-
fortJi of water, The exalted Waterman, as
though specially to designate Him who says.
"If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and
drink!'

Promise of the Holy Spirit.
When Christ was about to leave the world
He said to His followers, "It is expedient for
you that I go away ; for if I go not away, the
Comforter will not come unto you ; but if I
depart, I will send Him unto you. . . . He
will guide you into all truth. . . . He will
show you things to come. . . . He shall glo-
rify me : for He shall receive of mine, and
shall show it unto you" (John 16). That
promise included all the divine life-power
issuing from the mediation of Christ for the
illumination, regeneration, and salvation of men
— all the renewing, cleansing, comforting, and
energizing grace for the gathering of the elect
and the bringing of believers to eternal life
and glory. The Holy Ghost was in the world
from the beginning, but here was the promise
of a new and enlarged grant and endowment,

THE SIGN OF AQUARIUS. 1 95

to lift, nourish, and distinguish Christian be-
lievers. The same was gloriously fulfilled on
the day of Pentecost, when " suddenly there
came a sound from heaven as of a rushing
mighty wind, and filled all the house where
they were sitting ; and they were all filled
with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak
with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them
utterance." And when the Jews mocked and
derided, the sacred explanation was that Jesus,
being raised up again from the dead and ex-
alted to the right hand of God, and having so
received of the Father, was now the Giver
and Shedder-forth of this marvellous power.
He is thus presented to our contemplation as
the glorified Pourer-forth from heaven of the
blessed waters of life and salvation ; in other
words, the true Aquarius, of whom the picture
in the sign was the prophecy and foreshowing.
Wherever the Scriptures represent the
Spirit and grace of God under the imagery
of waters, the idea of unfailing supply and
plenteous abundance is also invariably con-
nected with it. Sometimes it is a plentiful
rain ; sometimes it is a voluminous fountain ;
sometimes it is a great river flowing with ful-
ness that supplies a thousand life-freighted
rivulets. Inspiration tells us that the rock

I96 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

smitten by Moses was the type of the smiting
of Christ and the blessings proceeding from
Him ; but in that case the waters "gushed ;
they ran in dry places like a river." Isaiah
sings : " The glorious Lord will be unto us a
place of broad rivers and streams." Ezekiel's
river was deep and broad, healing even the
Dead Sea with the abundance of its flow.
Zechariah says these heavenly waters flow
out to both seas, and continue without cessa-
tion summer and winter alike. God's prom-
ise is, " I will open rivers in high places, and
fountains in the midst of the valleys : I will
make the wilderness a pool of water, and the
dry land springs of water;" which, as John
Brentius says, "denotes the great plenteous-
ness of the Word and eternal blessedness flow-
ing from Christ the Fountain." And the same
is characteristic of the picture in this sign.
From the urn of Aquarius flows a vast, con-
stant, and voluminous river. It flows in a
bending stream both to eastward and west-
ward, and enlarges as it flows. The imagery
of the Scriptures and the imagery of this sign
are exactly of a piece, and the true reason of
the coincidence is, that both were meant to
record and set forth the same elorious evan-

o

oelic truths.

the southern fish. 1 97

The Southern Fish.

That this sign was really framed to be a
picture of the risen and glorified Redeemer
pouring out from heaven the saving influences
and gifts of the Holy Ghost, is further evi-
denced by the first Decan of Aquarius. Those
who truly profit by the gifts and powers pro-
cured and poured out by our glorious Inter-
cessor are the people who believe in Christ,
the regenerate, the saved Church. These, as
we saw in our last, are the mystic fishes.
And here, as the first Decan of Aquarius, we
have the picture of a fish — Piscis Australis —
drinking in the stream which pours from the
urn of the beautiful One in heaven. It is the
picture of the believing acceptance of the in-
vitation of the text. Jesus stood and cried,
" If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and
drink ;" and here is a coming from below — a
glad coming to the stream which issues from
on high, a drinking in of the heavenly waters,
and a vigorous life sustained and expanded
by means of that drinking.

The mythic legends do not help us much
with regard to the interpretation of this con-
stellation, but they still furnish a few signif-
icant hints. Some say this fish represents

17*

I98 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Astarte, called Aphrodite by die Greeks and
Venus by the Romans, and that she here ap-
pears in the form into which she metamor-
phosed herself to escape the advances and
power of the horrible Typhon. Astarte was
the moon-goddess, the great mother, the em-
bodiment of the dependent but ever-produc-
tive feminine principle. In the symbology of
the Scriptures the moon sometimes denotes
the mother of the family, as in Joseph's dream
(Gen. 3j), and both the woman and the moon
are representatives of the Church. As the
woman was made out of the side of Adam
while He slept, so the Church was made out
of Christ by means of that deep sleep of death
which came upon Him, and to which He sub-
mitted for the purpose. The whole mystery
of marriage is the symbol of the union be-
tween Christ and His Church (Eph. 5 : 23-32).
Everywhere the congregation of believers is
pictured as the spouse of Christ, the spir-
itual woman, the mother of us all. And if
this fish represents the Astarte of the pa-
gan religion, we have only to strip off the
heathen impurities, and understand the ref-
erence in the sense and application of the
Scripture symbols, in order to find here a
picture of the regenerate people of God.

PEGASUS. 199

the Church, the bride of Christ, the mother
of saints.

So understood, the metamorphosis into a
fish is also applicable and significant, as in no
other interpretation. All true members of
the Church are transformed persons, made
over again by the power of a new spiritual
creation, and living a new life superadded to
Nature. It is by this spiritual metamorpho-
sis that we make our escape from the power
and dominion of the Devil. And it is by
means of this transformation that we have
our status and relations in the heavenly econ-
omy and kingdom. The light comes feebly
through the dark and murky atmosphere of
the pagan world ; but wherever we get sight
of a distinct ray, it easily resolves back into
the figures of the primeval constellations, and'
thence into the sacred story of redemption
through the promised Seed of the woman.

Pegasus.
And in perfect consistence with, and as fur-
ther illustration of, what I have given as the
meaning of this sign, is the second Decan.
Here is the figure of a great horse pushing for-
ward with full speed, with great wings spring-
ine from his shoulders. The elements of his

200 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

name, as in Isaiah 64 15 (4), signify the swift
divine messenger bringing joy to those whom
he meets, otherwise the horse of the opening ; or
as the Greeks put it, without obliteration of
the old Noetic nomenclature, the horse of the
gushing fountain — a celestial horse, ever asso-
ciated with glad song, the favorite of the
Muses, under whose hoofs the Pierian springs
started upon Mount Helicon, and on whose
back rode Bellerophon as he went forth to
slay the monster Chimaera.

The fables say that this wonderful horse
sprang into being from the slaying of Me-
dusa by Perseus ; that he was called Pegasus
(Trrjyyj-aoc), Horse of the Fountain, because he
first appeared near the springs of the ocean ;
that he lived in the palace of the King and
Father of gods, and thundered and lightened
for Jupiter ; and that Bellerophon obtained
possession of him through sacrifice to the
goddess of justice, followed by a deep sleep,
during which he was divinely given the gold-
en bridle which the wild horse obeyed, and
thus he was borne forth to victory, though not
without receiving a painful sting in his foot.

In the first chapter of Zechariah the ap-
pearance of such horses are the symbols of
those whom " God hath sent to walk to and

PEGASUS. 20 1

fro through the earth," not simply to see and
report the condition of affairs, but to shake
and disturb nations, so as to restore liberty,
peace, and blessing to God's people. Pega-
sus is not precisely one of those horses, or
all of them combined in one, but still a some-
what corresponding ambassador of God. Pe-
gasus is winged ; he moves with heavenly
speed. The first part of his or his riders
name, Pega, Peka, or Pacha, in the Noetic
dialects means the chief ; and the latter part,
sus, means, not only a horse, but swiftly com-
ing or returning, with the idea of joy-bring-
ing; hence the chief co7ning forth again in
great victory, and with good tidings and bless-
ing to those to whom he comes. The ancient
names of the stars which make up his con-
stellation are — Markab, the returning ; Scheat,
he who goeth and returneth ; Enif the
Branch ; Al Genib, who carries ; Homan, the
waters ; Matar, who causeth the plenteous
overflow. The names show to what the pic-
ture applies.

Gathering up these remarkable items, and
combining them, as they all readily combine,
in one consistent narrative, we have in' aston-
ishing fulness one of the sublimest evangelic
presentations ; nay, the very going forth of

202 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Christ in His living Gospel, as from the
scenes of that supper-hall which witnessed
the coming of the Paraclete the joyous wa-
ters of cleansing and redemption, through
His successful mediation, poured their glad
flood into our weary world. Then the word
was, " Go ye into all the world, and preach
the Gospel [Good Tidings] to every crea-
ture. He that believeth and is baptized shall
be saved." Thenceforward, Parthians and
Medes, and Elamites, and the dwellers in
Mesopotamia, and in Judaea, and Cappadocia,
in Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia,
in Egypt, in Lybia, and strangers of Rome,
Jews and proselytes, Cretes and Arabians, and
people to the farthest ends of the earth, were
made to hear, in their tongues, the wonderful
works and achievements of God for the re-
newal and saving of men. Thenceforward
the Glad Tidings went, winged with the Spirit
of God, waking poetic springs of joy upon
the mountains and in the valleys, slaying the
powers of darkness and superstition, over-
whelming the dominion of the Devil, and
bringing song and salvation to every thirsty
and perishing soul which hears and obeys the
call of the Lord of life to come unto Him and
drink. The true Pegasus is the herald and

THE SWAN. 203

bringer of Christ's mediatorial success and
salvation to a famishing world, which the
saintly patriarchs looked for from the begin-
ning, and which they thus figured in the con-
stellations in advance as an imperishable wit-
ness of what was to come through and by
that Coming One in whom all their hopes
were centred.

The Swan.
The final side-piece which accompanies the
Zodiacal Aquarius accords precisely with this
presentation. It is one of the most interest-
ing and beautiful of the constellations, both in
its natural peculiarities and in its evangelic
references. It consists of eighty-one stars —
one of the first or second magnitude, six of
the third, and twelve of the fourth ; and some
of these never set. It embraces at least five
double stars and one quadruple. The binary
star (61 Cygni) is the most remarkable known
in the heavens. It is one of the nearest to our
system of the fixed stars. It consists of two
connected stars, which, besides their revolution
about each other, have a common progres-
sive and uniform motion toward some deter-
minate region, and moving thousands of
times faster than the swiftest body known to

^04 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

our system. This constellation has a number
of distinct systems in itself, and shows plan-
etary nebulae which have led astronomers tc
regard it as the intermediate link between
the planetary worlds and the nebulous stars.
It has in it specimens of both, and lies in the
midst of the great Galactic Stream of nebu-
lous stars. It is therefore remarkably suited
to represent that peculiar and complex econ-
omy— partly celestial and partly terrestrial,
partly acting by itself and partly dependent
on the heavenly powers — by which grace and
salvation are carried and ministered to the
children of men.

The figure in this constellation is the figure
of aszvan, the lordly bird-king of the waters,
in all ages and in all refined countries con-
sidered the emblem of poetic dignity, purity,
and grace. By the Greeks and Romans it
was held sacred to the god of beauty and the
Muses, and special sweetness was connected
with its death. ^Eschylus sung,

"The swan,
Expiring, dies in melody."

As the white dove is the emblem of the
Holy Ghost, so the elegant, pure, and grace-
ful swan is a fitting emblem of Him who, dy-

THE SWAN. 205

inor sends forth the elad river of livine waters,
and presides in His majesty over the admin-
istration of them to the thirsty children of
men. And this is here the underlying idea.

But this swan is on the zving, in the act of
rapid flight, " circling and returning," as its
name in Greek and Latin signifies. It seems
to be flying down the Milky Way, in the same
general direction with the river which pours
from the heavenly urn. The principal stars
which mark its wings and length of body
form a large and beautiful cross, the most
regular of all J:he crosses formed by the con-
stellations. It is thus the bird of matchless
beauty, purity, dignity, and grace, bearing
aloft the cross, and circling with it over the
blessed waters of life ; whilst in the naming
of its stars, the brightest is Deneb, the Lord or
Judge to come ; Azel, who goes and returns ;
Fafage, glorious, shining forth ; Sadr, who re-
turns as in a circle ; Adige, flying swiftly ;
Arided, He shall come down ; and other words'
of like import, we find strong identifications
of this lordly bird-king of the waters with Him
who, through the preaching of His cross hither
and thither over all this nether world, cries
and says, " If any man thirst, let him come tmto
Me, and dj'ink."
is

206 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Greek and Roman mythology is greatly at
a loss to account for the presence of this bird
in the sky ; but the stones on the subject are
not destitute of thought and suggestion cor-
responding with the evangelic truth. The
Greeks enumerated a collection of characters
of different parentages and histories, each re-
puted to have been the original of this swan
in the heavens. One was the son of Apollo,
a handsome hunter, who in some strange fit
leaped into Lake Canope, and was metamor-
phosed into this swan. Another was the son
of Poseidon, an ally of the Trojans, who could
not be hurt with arms of iron, but was stran-
gled by Achilles — whose body, when the victor
meant to rifle it, suddenly took its departure
to heaven in the form of a swan. A third was
the son of Ares, killed by Herakles in a duel,
who at his death was changed by his father
into a swan. A fourth was the son of Sthene-
lus and a dear friend and relative of Phaeton,
who so lamented the fate of him whom Jupiter
destroyed for his bad driving of the chariot
of the sun that Apollo metamorphosed him
into a swan and placed him among the stars.
Some dim embodiments of the true prophetic
delineations of this swan, and of that history
of the Redeemer through which He came to

A BEAUTIFUL PICTURE. 20y

the position and relations in which this pic
ture received fulfilment, appear in the several
myths. Christ was of divine birth and nature.
He was in himself invincible. He did submit
to death in heroic conflict with the powers of
darkness and the just penalties due the sins
of the world. It was His great love for those
to whom He became a Brother that brought
him down to the dark river. His body did
take life again after death, and disappear into
a new form of brightness and glory to assume
position in the heavens. In these several par-
ticulars the myths touching this constellation
are in remarkable accord with the Gospel his-
tory, and help to reflect how minute and clear
and vivid were the believing anticipations of
the makers of these signs already in the very
first ages of our race.

A Beautiful Picture.
Thus, then, in the Zodiacal Aquarius we
have the picture in the stars of the heavenly
waters of life and salvation ; of their source
in the beautiful Seed of the woman, slain in-
deed, but risen again and lifted up in ever-
lasting glory ; of the voluminous plenteous
ness in which they flow down into all our dry
and thirsty world ; of the new creation and

208 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

joyous life they bring to those who drink
them ; of the swift heralding and bearing of
the glad provision to all people ; and of the
graceful holding forth of the cross to the na-
tions over which, on outspread wings, the
Lord of these waters circles, in His meek
loveliness ever calling, "If any man thirst, let
him come unto Me, and drink."

Beautiful picture of most precious Gospel
truths ! — a picture which I can interpret no
otherwise than as intended by men fully in-
formed beforehand of these glorious facts.
And if, perchance, these constellations were
not meant in token, testimony, and prophecy
of what was foreknown, believed, and expect-
ed by the primeval patriarchs who arranged
them, the picture is still true to what has since
come to pass, and which it is part of our holy
religion to accept and rejoice in as the great
mercy of God to a fallen world. Christ Jesus
is the beautiful Saviour of mankind, Son of
God and Son of man. He did come in the
flesh and live a human life in which humanity
came to its loveliest and highest bloom. He
did suffer and die a violent death from offend-
ed justice on account of sin which He assumed,
but in no degree chargeable to Him. He did
rise again from death by the power of the

A BEAUTIFUL PICTURE. 209

eternal Spirit, changed, transfigured, and glo-
rified, and soar away beyond all reach of en-
emies, even to the calm heavens, where no
revolutions of time can any more obscure His
brightness or eclipse the outshining of His
glory. He is there as the Lord of life and
grace, obtaining by His meritorious interces-
sion an exhaustless fulness of spiritual treas-
ures, like very rivers of renewing and sancti-
fying mercies, which He has poured, and is
ever pouring, down into our world for the
comfort, cheer, and salvation of those who be-
lieve in Him. He has arranged, and himself
conducts and energizes, a great system of
means for carrying and proclaiming the same
all over the world amid songs of halleluia and
rejoicing which can never die. Deep in it all
He has embedded the great doctrine of His
Cross and Passion as the central thought and
brightest substance of the sublime and won-
derful economy. And in and amid it all faith
beholds Him in His lordly beauty stationed
by the true Pierian spring, ever crying and
ever calling, " If any man thirst, let him come
unto Me, and drink."

" Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to
the waters ; and he that hath no money, come
ye, buy, and eat ; yea, come, buy wine and

18* 0

2IO THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

milk without money and without price ;" "And
the Spirit and the Bride say, Come. And let
him that heareth say, Come. And let him
that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let
him take the water of life freely." Blessed
tidings ! blessed provision ! blessed opportu-
nity ! O man ! awake to the glory and drink ;
drink deep, drink earnestly, drink with all the
capacity of thy soul ; for thy Lord and Re-
deemer saith, "Whosoever drinketh of the
water that I shall give him shall never thirst ;
but the water that I shall give him shall be in
him a well of water springing up into ever-
lasting life."

" The Fountain flows ! It pours in fullest measure
Of grace and power — a great and plenteous flood !
Drink — drink, O man ! Drink in the crystal treasure,
Nor thirst, nor die, but live the life of God."

Eecture Jitnti).

THE MYSTIC FISHES.

John 21 : 6 : " And He said unto them, Cast the net on the right
side of the ship, and ye shall find. They cast therefore, and now
they were not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes."

OUR blessed Saviour taught by acts, as
well as words. He gave out parables
in deeds, as well as in stories and descriptions.
All His works of wonder were living allego-
ries— pictures and prophecies incarnated in
visible and tangible facts. This is particu-
larly true of the miracle to which the text
refers. It was a supernatural thing, to prove
the divine power of Him by whom it was
wrought ; but its chief significance lies in its
symbolic character as an illustration of that
catching of men by the preaching of the
Gospel to which the Apostles were called
and ordained.

Apostolic Fishing.
At the beginning of his ministry, seeing
Peter and Andrew casting a net into the sea,

211

212 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

He said unto them, " Follow me, and I will
make you fishers of men ;" that is, ministers
of the Word, who by the holding forth of the
truth were to cast the great evangelic net
into the sea of the world, and enclose people
as Christian believers and members of the
Church. So He also said, " The kingdom of
heaven is like unto a net that was cast into
the sea, and gathered of every kind, which,
when it was full, they drew to shore, and sat
down, and gathered the good into vessels, but
cast the bad away." So, likewise, when He
commanded Peter to launch out into the deep
and let down the nets for a draught, which re-
sulted in taking such a multitude of fishes that
the nets brake in the drawing, and two boats
were loaded down to the sinking point with
the product, He meant to show the disciples
not only His divine power, but a picture of
that mystic fishing on which he was about to
send them, and which was to be the work of
His ministers in all the ages. And the mir-
acle before us is a corresponding picture of
the same thing — with this difference, that the
other instances refer to the Church nominal
and visible as it appears to human view, em-
bracing both good and bad, to be assorted in
the day of judgment ; whilst the reference

APOSTOLIC FISHING. 2 I 3

here is to the inward, true, invisible Church —
the Church as it appears to the eye of God —
which includes none but the good, the genu-
ine children of grace and salvation, the def-
inite number of real saints.

It is thus abundantly established and clear
that in the symbology of the Scriptures and
the teachings of Christ the congregation of
those who profess to believe in Him — that is,
the Church — is likened to fishes enclosed in
the fisherman's net. The world is likened to
a sea, in which natural men range without
control, following their own likes and impulses,
and belonging to no one. So the Gospel is
likened to a net, which the ministering ser-
vants of the Lord spread in the waters in
order to enclose and crather men — not to je_

o

stroy them, but to secure them for Christ,
that they may be held by His word and grace
and be His peculiar possession. And when
they are thus secured and brought within the
enclosure of the influences and laws of the
Gospel as Christ's professed followers, and
formed into His congregation, they are His
mystic fishes, caught by His command and
direction and made His peculiar property.
The aptness of the figure no one can dis-
pute, and the scripturalness of the imagery

214 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

is fixed and settled beyond all possibility of
mistake. Christ himself makes fishes the
symbol of His Church.

But as is the picture in the Scriptures, so
we find in the figures of the constellations.
The new life that rises out of the death of
the sacrificial eoat is in the form of a laro-e
and vigorous fish. Those who come to the
heavenly Waterman to drink in the stream
of living influences which he pours down from
on high are represented by a great fish. And
as the Church is the most important institute,
result, and embodiment of the redemptive
work and achievements of the Seed of the
woman, so we have one of the twelve signs
of the Zodiac specially and exclusively de-
voted to it ; and that sign is the sign of the
Fishes, which we are now to consider.

The Sign of Pisces.
This constellation is now the first in the
order of the twelve signs of the Zodiac ; but
in the original order, which I have been fol-
lowing, it is the seventh. The figure by which
it is represented consists of two large fishes,
one headed toward the north pole, and the
other parallel with the path of the Sun. They
are some distance apart, but are tied to the

THE MYTHS. 21 5

two ends of a long, undulating band or rib-
bon, which is held by the foot of the Ram in
the next succeeding sign.

The names of this sign in Hebrew and
Arabic, as in the Greek and Latin, mean the
same as in English — the Fishes. In Syriac it
is called Niino, the Fish prolonged, the fish with
the idea of posterity or successive generations.
In Coptic its name is Pi-cot Orion, the Fisky
congregation, or company of the coming Pj'ince.
Two prominent names in the sign are O/cda,
the United, and Al Samaca, the Upheld. And
all the indications connected with Pisces tend
to the conclusion that in these two great fishes
we are to see and read precisely what was
symbolized by Christ in the miracle to which
the text refers ; namely, a pictorial represen-
tation of the Church.

The Myths.
The origin of this sign, as mythology gives
it, is not at variance with this idea. It is said
that Venus and Cupid were one day on the
banks of the Euphrates, and were there sur-
prised by the apparition of the giant monster
Typhon. To save themselves they plunged
into the river, and escaped by being changed
into fishes — saved by transformation through

2l6 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

water. To commemorate the occurrence it
is said that Minerva placed these two fishes
among the stars.

We have already noted some symbolic con-
nection between the mythic Venus and the
Church. The ancient Phoenicians, according
to Nigidius, asserted that she was hatched
from an egg by a heavenly dove. Cupid, or
the ancient Eros, was held to be the first-born
of the creation, one of the causes in the for-
mation of the world, the uniting love-power
which brought order and harmony to the con-
flicting elements of Chaos. The later fables of
Cupid are remote inventions out of the orig-
inal cosmic Eros, the ideas concerning whom
well agree with the sign, and readily interpret
in their application to Christ and the Church.
Christ was " the first-born of every creature "
(Col. 1:15), and is the Head of "the general
assembly and Church of the first-born," who,
through His uniting love, combines the chaotic
elements of humanity into order and union
with himself, bringing into being the mystic
Woman, " born of water and of the Spirit,"
which is part of His own mystic organism,
His body. By that means also those who
compose the Church escape the hundred-
headed enemy of God and all good. And in

TWOFOLDNESS OF THE CHURCH. 217

so far as this sign of the Fishes was divinely
framed and placed in the heavens to com-
memorate this transformation and deliverance
by water, it is nothing more nor less than a
divine symbol of the Church — the imperson-
ation of escape from horrible confusion and
destruction, as also of that new-creating love
of God, the mother of all holy order and
salvation.

TWOFOLDNESS OF THE CHURCH.

These Fishes are two in number. The gen-
eral idea thus expressed is the idea of multi-
tude, which is characteristic of all the sacred
promises relating to the success of the Mes-
sianic work among men. The Church, in
comparison with the great unsanctified world
around it, is always a " little flock " — a special
elect called out from among the great body
of mankind outside of itself — just as the fishes
enclosed in a net are but a small portion of
the myriads that are in the sea. But, in itself
considered, multitudinousness is always one
of its characteristics. To Abraham it was
figured as the stars of the sky and as the
sand on the seashore for multitude. To Eze-
kiel the sacred waters embraced " a very great
multitude of fish." Every symbolic casting

19

2l8 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

of the net at Christ's command took a great
multitude of fishes. The very name carries
in it the idea of multitude, and the duplication
of the symbol gives the still further idea of
outspread multiplication — a glorious company
of Apostles, a goodly fellowship of Prophets,
a noble army of Martyrs, a holy Church
throughout all the world.

But, beyond this, the Church, in historical
fact and development, is twofold. There was
a Church before Christ, and there is a Church
since Christ ; and whilst these two make up
the one universal Church, they are still quite
distinct in character. The patriarchal Church,
which was more definitely organized under
the institutes given by Moses, was one. It is
a singular fact that the ancient rabbis always
considered the people of Israel as denoted by
this sign. The Sethites and Shemites, and all
adherents to the true God and His promises
and worship, were by both themselves and
the heathen astronomically associated with
these Fishes. They are certainly one set of
the great Saviour's fishes. The Christian
Church, organized under the institutes of
Jesus Christ, was the other of these Fishes.
Though in some sense the same old Church
reformed, it was still in many respects quite

TWO FOLD NESS OF THE CHURCH. 2ig

another — so much so that it became apostasy
to turn from it to "the beggarly elements"
of the former dispensation. Here, then, are
the two great branches or departments of the
one great universal Church of the promised
Seed of the woman. To the one His coming
was future, and so it dealt in types, shadows,
symbols, and figures of the true. To the other
the ancient anticipations have passed into ac-
tual fact, and exist as living realities, already
far on the way toward the final consummation.
The faith of both is the same, and the spiritual
life of both is the same. Hence both are mys-
tic Fishes. But the stage of development, the
historical place and condition, and the entire
external economy, are different, as type and
antitype are different, though in interior sub-
stance one and the same. The Fish in its
multitudinousness symbolizes both. The old
Church was the Fish arising out of the slain
sacrifice believed in in advance, and signified
in the old ordinances ; and the new Church,
organized under Christ, is the Fish arising
afresh out of the same, which has now become
an accomplished and existing reality. Hence
the whole thing- was fore-signified in the stars
under the image of two Fishes, which are in-
deed two under one method of conception, and

220 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

yet one and the same in another method of.
conception. It is the one Fish in both, yet two
Fishes in historic presentation and external
dispensation.

The Band.

The Decans of this sign serve to bring
out this idea with great clearness. The first
Decan is a very long waving Ribbon or Band.
The ancient name of it is Al Risha, the Band
or bridle. It is one, continuous, unbroken
piece, and so doubled that one of its ends
goes out to the northern Fish, and is tightly
bound around its tail ; whilst the other end
goes out to the other Fish, and is fastened to
it in the same way. By this Band these two
Fishes are inseparably tied together, so that
the one cannot get on without the other.
And so the fact is. The patriarchal Church
is really tied to the Christian Church. The
Epistle to the Hebrews tells us that the an-
cient saints, from Adam onward, could not
be made perfect without us (chap, n : 40).
The consummation of all they hoped for was
inevitably tied up with what was to be subse-
quently achieved by Christ, much of which is
still a matter of promise and hope. And so
the Christian Church is really tied to the; pa-

THE BAND. 221

triarchal Church. All the necessary prepara-
tions and foundations for Christianity were
vouchsafed through the Old Testament.
What was then testified, believed, and looked
for we must needs also accept, believe, and
take in. The Christian does not stand just '
where the ancient believer stood, but the old
was the bridge by which the new was reach-
ed. Christ came not to destroy the law and
the prophets, but to fulfil them, and to com-
plete what they looked to and anticipated.
There could be no Christian Church without
the patriarchal going before it, just as there
could be no patriarchal Church without the
Christian coming after it to complete and ful-
fil what the old was meant to prepare for
And here is the Band of connection unalter-
ably binding them together in a unity which
still is dual.

The doubled part of this Band, strange to
say, is in the hand or front foot of the sym-
bolic figure in the next succeeding sign ; that
is, in the hand of Aries, the Ram or Lamb.
The point of unity between these two Fishes
is therefore in Christ and His administrations,
by which both are equally affected and up-
held. Both belong to Christ in the attitude
of the reigning and victorious Lamb. He up-

19 *

222 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

holds, guides, and governs them by one and
die same Band. These Fishes thus have their
places and status by His appointment and au-
thority. They are caught Fishes, no longer
roaming at large according to their own will.
They are bound together in the hand of the
glorious Lamb. They are His. and are up-
held, governed, and made to fulfil their offices
and mission by His power, will, and grace.
And this is precisely the relation and condi-
tion of the Church in all dispensations. Like
the net of Peter, which held, controlled, and
lifted the literal fishes enclosed by it, so this
Band holds, controls, and lifts the mystic Fishes
which constitute the Church. It is the tie of
connection between all saints, and at the same
time the tie of connection between them and
the glorified Saviour, by whose word they
have been taken and made His precious pos-
session. " Without Me ye can do nothing."
was His word when on earth ; and ever of
old His promise has been : " Thou whom I
have taken from the ends of the earth, and
called from the chief men thereof, and said
unto thee, Thou art my servant ; fear not,
for I am with thee ; be not dismayed, for I am
thy God ; I will strengthen thee ; yea, I will
help thee ; yea, / will uphold thee with the

CEP HE US. 223

right hand of my righteousness!' And here
is the same word pictorially expressed.

Cepheus.
Who the friend and protector of these
Fishes is, the second accompanying side-piece
also very sublimely shows. Here is the fig-
ure of a glorious king, wearing his royal robe,
bearing aloft a branch or sceptre, and having
on his head a crown of stars. He is calmly
seated in the repose of power, with one foot
on the solstitial colure, and the other on the
pole-star itself, whilst his right hand grasps
the Ribbons. Bearing with us what the
Scriptures tell of the present exaltation and
glory of Jesus Christ, we here behold every
particular so completely and thrillingly em-
braced that the picture stands self-interpreted.
It so vividly portrays our enthroned Saviour,
and fits so sublimely to Him, and to Him only,
that no special prompting is necessary to en-
able us to see Hkn in it. And if we need fur-
ther assurance on the subject, we find it in the
accompanying star-names.

On the right shoulder of this figure, in
glittering brilliancy, shines a star whose name,
Al Deramin, means the Quickly-rehtrning. In
the girdle shines another, equally conspicuous

224 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

whose name, Al Phirk, means the Redeemer.
In the left knee is still another, whose name
means the Shepherd. The Egyptians called
this royal figure Pe-ku-hor, the Rider that com-
eth. His more common designation is Ce-
pheus, which means the royal Branch, the
King. Everything thus combines to identify
this figure as intended to represent our Sa-
viour as now enthroned in glory, even the
Seed of the woman, clothed with celestial
royalty and dominion.

In the Zodiac of Dendera the figure in this
constellation is a laree front lee of an animal
connected with a small figure of a sheep, in
the same posture as Aries in the next sign.
It is the strong hand of the Lamb, and so the
same which holds the Band of the Fishes.
It identifies what is otherwise represented as
a glorious king with the upholder of the
Fishes, and makes Cepheus one and the same
with the victorious Lamb.

Christ has been really invested with all
royal rights and dominion. It was predicted
of Him from of old, " He shall bear the glory,
and shall sit and rule upon His throne" (Zech.
6 : 13). And so the testimony of the Apostles
is that, having been made a little lower than
the angels for the suffering of death, and hav-

AND R OMEDA. 225

ing humbled himself to the cross for our re-
demption, God hath highly exalted Him, and
set Him on His own right hand in the heav-
ens, far above all principality, and power, and
might, and dominion, and every name that is
named, not only in this world, but also in that
which is to come, and hath put all things un-
der His feet, and gave Him to be Head over
all things to the Church, which is His body,
the fulness of Him that nlleth all in all (Eph.
i : 19-23). Hence also it is said to all be-
lievers, " Ye are complete in Him, which is
the Head of all principality and power" (Col.
2 : 10). With a high hand and an outstretched
arm He sitteth in royal majesty to help, up-
hold, and deliver His Church ; " and of the
increase of His government and peace there
shall be no end."

Andromeda.
A still further representation of the Church
is supplied in the third Decan of this sign.
This is the picture of a beautiful woman, with
fetters upon her wrists and ankles, and fas-
tened down so as to be unable to rise. This
woman in the Decan is the same as the Fishes
in the sign. The change of the image argues
no change in the subject. The Church is oft-

p

2 26 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

en a woman, and oftener than it is a net full
of fishes ; but it is both — sometimes the one,
and sometimes the other — in the representa-
tions of the Scriptures. Besides, in some of
the ancient planispheres these Fishes were
pictured with the heads of women, thus iden-
tifying them with the woman.

Greek mythology calls this woman Andro-
meda (andro-medo), man-ruler, but with what
idea, or for what reason, does not appear in
the myths. The name is perhaps derived
from some ancient designation of similar sig-
nificance, which has no meaning in the Greek
fables, but which covers a most important and
inspiring biblical representation respecting the
Church. Here we discover the true Andro-
meda— the mystic woman called and appointed
to rule and guardianship over men. When
Peter wished to know what he and his fellow-
disciples should have by way of compensa-
tion for having forsaken everything for Christ,
the blessed Master said : " Ye which have fol-
lowed Me, in the regeneration, when the Son
of man shall sit in the throne of His glory,
ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging
the twelve tribes of Israel" (Matt. 19:28).
Hence Paul spoke to the Corinthians as of a
well-understood fact, " Do ye not know that

ANDROMEDA. 22?

the saints shall judge the world ?" (i Cor. 6:2).
Hence the enraptured John ascribes everlast-
ing glory and dominion to the divine Christ,
not only for washing us from our sins in His
own blood, but that He" hath made us kings
and priests unto God" (Rev. 1 : 5, 6). The
true people of God, the real Church, are the
elect kings of the future ages. Even now
already they are embodiments and bearers
of the heavenly kingdom and dominion upon
earth. Through them the word goes forth
for the governing of men, and the regulation
of their hearts and lives, and the bringing of
them under a new spiritual dominion, so that
none ever come to forgiveness and glory ex-
cept as they come into submission to the truth
and the teachings of the Church. The great
All-Ruler has so united the Church to him-
self, and so embodied himself in it, that by its
word, testimonies, and ordinances He rules,
governs, tutors, and guards men, and brings
them under His saving dominion. The Proph-
ets, Apostles, Confessors, Pastors, and Teach-
ers which He has raised up in the Chinch,
with those associated with them in the fellow-
ship of the same faith and work, are the true
kings and guardians of men, who have been
ruling from their spiritual thrones for all these

228 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ages, and will continue to rule more and
more for ever as the spiritual and eternal
kingdom [s more and more revealed and en-
forced. Most significantly, therefore, may
the Church be called Andromeda; and the
fact that the mystic woman in this constella-
tion is so called, with no other known reason
for it, goes far to identify her as verily in-
tended to be a prophetic picture of the Church,
which she truly represents beyond anything
else that has ever been in fable or in fact.

Andrpmeda's Chains.
But this woman is in chains, bound hand
and foot. The names in the siom mean the
B 'oken-down, the Weak, the Afflicted, the
CJiaiiied. The fables say that she was the
daughter of Cepheus and Cassiopeia, prom-
ised to her uncle Phineus in marriage, when
Neptune sent a flood and a sea-monster to
ravage the country in answer to the resentful
clamors of his favorite nymphs against Cas-
siopeia, because she boasted herself fairer
than Juno and the Nereides. Nor would the
incensed god be pacified until, at the instance
of Jupiter Ammon, the beautiful Andromeda
was exposed to the sea-monster, chained to a
rock near Joppa in Palestine, and left to be

ANDROMEDA'S CHAINS. 22Q

devoured. But Perseus, on returning from
the conquest of the Gorgons, rescued her
and made her his bride.

Here, then, was a case of malignant jeal-
ousy and persecution resulting in the disa-
bility, exposure, and intended destruction of
an innocent person. And thus, again, we
have a striking picture of the unfavorable
side of the Church's condition in this world.
Jealous rivals hate her and clamor against
her. The world-powers in their selfishness
fail to protect her, and lend themselves for
her exposure and destruction. Innocently
she is made to suffer. Though a lovely and
influential princess, she is hindered by per-
sonal disabilities and bonds. It will not be
so always. The time will come when those
bonds shall be broken and that exposure
ended. There is One en^a^ed m a war wjth
the powers of darkness and the children of
hell who will presently come this way to res-
cue and deliver the fair maiden and to make
her His glorious bride. But for the present
affliction and hardship are appointed to her.
She cannot move as she would, or enjoy what
pertains to her royal character, her innocence,
and her beauty. She is bound to the hard,
cold, and ponderous rock of this earthly life,
20

23O THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Born to reign with her redeeming Lord, Apos-
tles can only wish that she did reign, that
they might reign with her. She is within thes
sacred territory, but it is as yet a place of
captivity and bonds. She never can be truly
herself in this mortal life. Nor is she com-
pletely free from the oppressive Phineus un-
til the victorious Perseus comes. The whole
picture is true to the life, and shows with what
profound prophetic foresight and knowledge
the makers of these signs were endowed.

Ill-Favor of the Church.
Among the ancients the Zodiacal Pisces
was considered the most unfavorable of all
the signs. The astrological calendars de-
scribe its influences as malignant, and inter-
pret its emblems as indicative of violence and
death. The Syrians and the Egyptians large-
ly abstained from the eating of fish, from the
dread and abhorrence which they associated
with the Fishes in the Zodiac. In the hiero-
glyphics of Egypt the fish is the symbol of
odiousness, dislike, and hatred. And this,
too, falls in exactly with our interpretation.
The earthly condition and fortunes of the
Church are nothing but unfavorable and re-
pulsive to the tastes and likes of carnal and

ILL- FAVOR OF THE CHURCH. 23 I

self-seeking man. The restraints and disabil-
ities which go along with it are what the world
hates, derides, and rebels against. These
Bands that bind the Fishes together, and hold
them with bridles of heavenly command and
control, and enclose them with meshes be-
yond which they cannot pass, are what un-
sanctified humanity disdains as humiliation
and reckons as adversity to the proper joy
and good of life. Though people can sus-
tain no charges against the Church, and can-
not deny her princely beauty, yet to take
sides with her is to them nothing but flood,
drowning, and devastation to what they most
cherish and admire. Let her be chained, dis-
abled, exposed and devoured, if need be, only
so that they are exempt from association with
her ! Let her suffer, and let her be given to
death and destruction, the more and the soon-
er the better if they only can thereby have
the greater freedom for their likes, passions,
and enjoyments uncurbed and unrestrained !
This is the feeling and this the spirit which
have obtained toward the Church in all the
ages. And the dislike of men to this sign is
but the filling out of the picture in the stars
as I have been expounding it. It is another
link in the chain of evidence that we have

232 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

here a divine symbol of the Church in its
earthly estate and career. The coincidences,
to say the least, are very marvellous. To say
that the Church has been formed from and to
the signs, as French infidelity would have it,
is in the highest degree absurd. The Church
has not accepted humiliation, disability, con-
tempt, hatred, and oppression from the world
just to conform herself to the indications con-
nected with Pisces ; and yet her condition to-
day, as in all other time, is precisely that which
this sign represents, and has been represent-
ing on the face of the sky for all these four or
five thousand years. The sign has in no sense
or degree conditioned the Church, and yet it
truly represents the estate of the Church in
all generations. To what other conclusion,
then, can we come than that the sign in its
place, and the whole system of signs of which
it forms a conspicuous part, is from that good
and infallible prescience which knows the
course and end of all things from the begin-
ning ? Let those doubt it who will ; for my
own part, I have no doubt upon the subject.

Hccture Sentij.

THE BLESSED OUTCOME.

Rev. 5:12: " Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power,
and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honor, and glory, and
blessing."

THIS is the myriad-voiced response of
die heavenly world to the triumphant
song of the redeemed after the Church has
run its earthly course. It immediately follows
that time, now near at hand, when the great
voice from the sky, as of a trumpet, shall say,
to all the holy dead and to all God's saints,
" Come up hither." The whole scene rep-
resents that heavenly condition of the elect
to be realized at the fulfilment of the apos-
tolic word, which says, " The Lord himself
shall descend from heaven with a shout, with
the voice of the archangel, and with the trump
of God : and the dead in Christ shall rise first :
then we which are alive and remain shall be
caught up together with them in the clouds,
to meet the Lord in the air" (1 Thess. 4: 16,
17). It is the same scene to which Jesus

20* 233

234 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

himself referred when He said : " Whereso-
ever the body is, thither will the eagles be
gathered together" (Luke 17 : 37). And it
is precisely this scene that is signified by the
eighth sioqi of the Zodiac — the last of the
quaternary relating more especially to the
Church.

The text celebrates the worthiness, glory,
and dominion of the Lamb, who is further de-
scribed as appearing to have been slain, but
here as standing in the midst of the throne,
having the perfection of strength and wisdom,
and the fulness of spiritual and divine energy
operative in the world for the complete sal-
vation of His people ; for this is what is
meant by the " seven horns and seven eyes —
the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all
the earth." And in the sign of Aries we
have this same Lamb, or Prince of the flock,
the Son of man as the Head, Sacrifice, and
High Priest of the Church, lifted up upon the
path of the Sun, looking forth in the repose
of power, and working that very translation
and glorification of His people which the
Scriptures everywhere set before us as the
blessed hope of all saints.

To this interesting presentation, then, let
us now direct our attention.

THE SIGN OF ARIES. 2$$

•s

The Sign of Aries.

The figure here is that of a vigorous Ram.
It is called Aries, the Chief, the Head ; as Ar-
yan means the Lordly. So Christ is the Chief,
the Head and Lord of His Church. The
English name, Ram, means high, great, ele-
vated, lifted up. In Syriac the name is Amroo,
the Lamb, the same as John i : 29, where it is
said, " Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh
away the sin of the world ;" also the Branch,
the Palm-branch, recognized by the Jews as
denotive of Christ's royal coming to His
Church. The Arabic calls this figure Al
Hamal, the Sheep, the Gentle, the Merciful.
The principal stars included in this figure are
called El Nath or El Natik, and Al Sharetan,
which mean the Wounded, the Bruised, the
Slain. Over the head of the figure is a ^r[.
angle, which the old Greeks said exhibited
the name of the Deity, and its principal star
bears a name signifying the Head, the Up-
lifted, hence the Lamb exalted to the divine
glory, to the throne of the all-holy One.

It is unreasonable to suppose that all this
could have happened by mere accident. There
was manifestly some intelligent design by
which the whole was arranged. And the

236 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

entire presentation is in thorough accord with
what the Scriptures say concerning the Seed
of the woman. As the Son of man He is
continually represented as the Head and
Prince of the flock, the Lamb — " the Lamb
that was slain" — the Lamb lifted to divine
dominion and glory. In His pure, meek, and
sacrificial character the Scriptures style Christ
" the Lamb of God, which taketh away the
sin of the world." In His exaltation He is
represented as " the Lamb in the midst of the
throne." In the administrations of judgment
upon the wicked world He is contemplated
as the Lamb, whose wrath is unbearable. As
the Bridegroom and Husband of the Church
He is also the Lamb, to whose marriaee-
supper the Gospel calls us. As the Keeper
of the Book of life in which the names of the
saints are written, the Lifter of the title-deed
of our inheritance, and the Breaker of the
seals by which the earth is purged of usurpers
and the mystery of God completed, He is
presented as " the Lamb." As the conso-
ciate of the eternal Father in the joy and
sovereignty of the world to come, in which
the saints glory for ever and ever, He is still
referred to as " the Lamb," by whose blood
they overcome and in whose light they live

THE MYTHIC STORIES. 2$J

world without end. And in whatever attitude
He appears, back of all He is still the Lamb.

The Mythic Stories.
The mythic stories concerning Aries still
further identify him with the Lamb of the text.
This noble and mysterious animal was given
by Nephele to her two children, Phrixus and
Helle, when Ino, their mortal stepmother, was
about to have them sacrificed to Jupiter. It
was by seating themselves on its back and
clinging to its fleece that they were to make
their escape. Nephele means the Cloud. She
is reputed the queen of Thebes ; and Thebes
was the house, city, or congregation of God.
We thus have the cloud over God's house, or
congregation, precisely as the Scriptures tell
of the cloud of God's gracious manifestations
to His ancient people — in their deliverance
from Egypt, in their journeyings in the wil-
derness, atid in their worship in the taber-
nacle and the temple. God visibly dealt with
them as their merciful Guide, Instructor, Pro-
tector, and Ruler ; and His gracious presence
was almost uniformly manifested in the form
of the cloud. Also in Job's time " thick
clouds" were His covering. It was by these
cloud-manifestations that He called and form-

238 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ed the congregation of His people, assembled
them around Him, and kept them in commu-
nion with himself as His Church or city.

The two children of the cloud are therefore
the same with the two Fishes in the preceding
sign ; that is, the multitudinous twofold Church,
which is born of these merciful divine manifes-
tations. These children were all under sen-
tence of death. So the Church, consisting- of
men who had fallen under the power of in-
coming sin, was in danger of being sacrificed.
From such a fate believers are delivered by
means of the blest " Lamb of God, which tak-
eth away the sin of the world."

This Lamb was furnished to these children
from the same cloud of which they themselves
are born ; and so Christ was begotten by the
power of the Highest coming upon and over-
shadowing the Virgin of Nazareth, and upon
himself at His baptism and transfiguration.

The safety of these children of the cloud
rested exclusively in this Lamb, and so the
name of Jesus is the only name given under
heaven among men whereby we can be saved.
Both of them in fact were safe, and carried far
aloft from Ino's reach and power, so long as
they both continued firmly seated on this
Lamb ; and so the Church is lifted far above

THE MYTHIC STORIES. 239

all condemnation by virtue of its being plant-
ed on Jesus Christ as its Help and Redeemer.
Helle, one of these cloud-children, became
giddy in the heavenly elevation to which she
was lifted by this Lamb, lost her hold upon
his back, and fell off into the sea, thereafter
called Hellespont, or Helle's Sea ; and so the
antediluvian Church apostatized and was
drowned in the flood ; as likewise the Israel-
itish Church, becoming giddy in its sublime
elevation, let go its hold on the Lamb by re-
jecting Christ, and dropped from its heavenly
position into the sea of the common world.
Phrixus, the more manly part of this mystic
cloud-seed, held on to the mystic Lamb, and
was brought in safety to Colchis, the citadel of
reconciliation, the city of refuge. So likewise
there has ever been a true people of God re-
maining faithful amid the apostasies around
them, who never let go their hold on the
Lamb of God, and are securely borne to the
citadel of peace and salvation.

Nephele's Lamb was sacrificed to Jupiter
as those who were saved by him would have
been without him ; and so Christ, the true
Aries, was sacrificed for us, and died in our
stead. He is "the Lamb slain from the foun-
dation of the world." And it was this Lamb

240 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

of Nephele that yielded the Golden Fleece,
which made him who possessed it the envy
of kings, and which constituted the highest
treasure to be found by the children of men.
And this, again, is a most striking image of
the heavenly robe of Christ's meritorious
righteousness, the sublimest and most en-
riching treasure and ornament of the Church,
which ever sin^s —

o

" Jesus, Thy blood and righteousness
My beauty are, my glorious dress ;
'Midst flaming worlds, in these arrayed,
With joy shall I lift up my head."

It is wonderful to see how these traditional
legends of the constellations interpret on the
theory that they have come from prophecies
and sacred beliefs touching the promised Seed
of the woman and the Church which He has
purchased with His blood.

It is also worthy of remark that the Egypt-
ians celebrated a sacred feast to the Ram upon
the entrance of the Sun into the sign of Aries.
They prepared for it before the full moon next
to the spring equinox, and on the fourteenth
day of that moon all Egypt was in joy over
the dominion of the Ram. Everybody put
foliage or boughs, or some mark of the feast,
over his door. The people crowned the ram

THE MYTHIC STORIES. 24 1

with flowers, carried him with extraordinary
pomp in grand processions, and rejoiced in
him to the utmost. It was then that the horn
was full. The ancient Persians had a similar
festival of Aries. For all this it is hard to
account except in connection with what was
prophetically signified by Aries. But taken
in relation to what the Scriptures foretell of
the Lamb, in the period when He shall take
to Him His great power for the deliverance
and glorification of His Church, we can easily
see how this would come to be one of the
very gladdest and most exultant of the sacred
feasts. It is when the Lamb thus comes upon
the throne, and appears for the taking up of
the deeds of the inheritance, the gladdest pe-
riod in all the history of the Church and peo-
ple of God is come. Then it is that the songs
break forth in heaven in tremendous volume
of Worthiness, and Blesssing, and Honor, and
Glory to the Lamb for redeeming men by His
blood, and making them kings and priests
unto God, and certifying unto them that now
they " shall reign on the earth."

And when we turn to the accompanying
Decans of this sign, the very work and do-
ings ascribed to the Lamb in this entrance
upon His great power are still more specific-
. 21 Q

242 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ally set before us, in which the joy in Him on
the part of His Church and people comes to
its culmination. The first of these is

Cassiopeia.

This is nothing less than a picture of the
true Church of God lifted up out of all evils,
bonds, and disabilities, and seated with her
glorious Redeemer in heaven. The figure is
that of a queenly woman, matchless in beauty,
seated in exalted dignity, with her foot on the
Arctic Circle, on which her chair likewise is
set. In one hand she holds aloft the branch
of victory and triumph, and with the other
she is spreading and arranging her hair, as
if preparing herself for some great public
manifestation. Albumazer says this woman
was anciently called " the daughter of splen-
dor," hence " the glorified woman." Her
common name is Cassiopeia, the beautiful,
the enthroned ; or, as Pluche derives the
name, the Boundary of Typhous power, the
Delivered from all evil. The constellation it-
self is one of the most beautiful in the heav-

ens.

" Wide her stars
Dispersed, nor shine with mutual aid improved;
Nor dazzle, brilliant with contiguous flame :
Their number fifty-five."

CASSIOPEIA. 243

Four stars of the third magnitude, which nev-
er set, form the seat upon which this woman
sits. The star on her rieht side is on the
equinoctial colure, and on a straight line with
Al Pherats in Andromeda's cheek to the north
pole. The constellation embraces a binary
star, a triple star, a double star, a quadruple
star, and an extraordinary number of star-
clusters of similar constituents to the general
field of greater stars.

About three hundred years ago there oc-
curred in this constellation what was a great
mystery to astronomers. A star, surpassing
in brilliancy and splendor all the fixed stars,
suddenly appeared on the tenth of Novem-
ber, 1572, and, after shining in continuous
glory for sixteen months, disappeared, and
has never since been seen, just as the Church
disappears in the shadow of death, or is pres-
ently to be caught away to the invisible world.

And if there is any one constellation of
the sky, or any figure among these celestial
frescoes, specially fitted to be the symbol and
representative of the Church, particularly in
its enfranchised and glorified condition, it is
this. The names are equally significant. The
first star marking the figure of this woman
is called Shedar, which means the Freed, and

244 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Ruchbah and Dat al Cursa, signifying the En-
throned, the Seated. On her right hand is also
the glorious star-crowned King, holding out
his sceptre toward her, whilst all the accounts
pronounce her his wife, just as the Scriptures
everywhere describe the Church as affianced
to Christ, hereafter to be married to Him as
" the bride, the Lamb's wife."

Cassiopeia is universally represented as
the mother of Andromeda ; and so the Apos
tie refers to the heavenly Church as the moth
er of the earthly Church. The Jerusalem
that is above " is the mother of us all." The
whole presentation is that of deliverance and
heavenly triumph, precisely as we speak of
the Church triumphant ; and the ready-mak-
ing is for the great marriage ceremonial.
(Compare Rev. 19 : 7, 8.)

The perfection of this woman's beauty,
fairer than Juno and the envy of all the
nymphs of the sea, likewise answers exactly
to the Scripture descriptions of the Church :
" Thy renown went forth among the heathen
for thy beauty ; for it was perfect through my
comeliness, which I put upon thee, saith the
Lord" (Ezek. 16:14). Christ is to present
it to himself, " a glorious Church, not having
spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing, but holy

CETUS. 245

and without blemish" (Eph. 5 : 27). Cassio-
peia is an enthroned queen ; and this is also
uniformly the biblical picture of the Church
when once it comes to enter upon its prom-
ised glory. John saw thrones, and they sat
upon them, and they reigned with Christ.
And it was further said that so " they shall
reign for ever and ever." The Church is
"the queen in gold of Ophir" of which the
Psalmist (45 : 9) so enthusiastically sung.

Cetus.
But when the time comes for the Church to
enter upon her royal exaltation and authority,
another very important and marked event is
to occur. John beheld it in apocalyptic vision,
and writes : " I saw an anorel come down from
heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit
and a great chain in his hand. And he laid
hold on the Dragon, that old Serpent, which
is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a
thousand years, and cast him into the bottom-
less pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon
him, that he should deceive the nations no
more, till the thousand years are fulfilled ; and
after that he must be loosed a little season "
(Rev. 20 : 1-3). And this is pictorially given
in the second Decan of Aries.
21 *

246 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

The picture is that of a great sea-monster
(Cetus), the true Leviathan of Job and Isaiah,
which covers the largest space of any one
figure in the sky. It is a vast scaly beast,
with enormous head, mouth, and front paws,
and having the body and tail of a whale. It
is generally called "the Whale" on our plani-
spheres. It is an animal of the waters and
marshes, and the natural enemy and devourer
of the fishes. It is the same which the sea-
god sent to devour Andromeda, and hence
the particular foe and persecutor of the
Church. It is a downward constellation, bor-
dering on the lower regions. One of its cha-
racteristic stars, Mira, situated in the neck
of the scaly monster, is the most wonderfully
variable and unsteady in the heavens. From
a star of the second magnitude it dwindles
away so as to become invisible once in about
every three hundred days, and Hevelius af
firms that it once disappeared for the space
of four years. It is a striking symbol of the
arch-Deceiver, and, singularly enough, its name
means the Rebel. And what is specially re-
markable in the case is, that the doubled end
of the Band which upholds the Fishes, after
passing the front foot or hand of the Lamb,
is fastened on the neck of this monster, and

CE TUS. 247

holds him firmly bound. The name of die
first of the Cetus stars, Mcnkar, refers to
this ; for Menkar means the chained Enemy.
And so the name of the second star, Diphda,
means the Overthrown, the Thrust-down.

Satan is loose now. Peter writes : " Your
adversary, the Devil, as a roaring lion, walk-
eth about, seeking whom he may devour "
(Pet. 5:8). God speaks of him, and puts the
confounding questions : " Canst thou draw out
Leviathan with an hook ? or his tongue with
the cord which thou lettest down ? Canst
thou put a hook into his nose ? or bore his
jaw through with a thorn ? Will he make
many supplications unto thee ? will he speak
soft words unto thee ? Will he make a cov-
enant with thee ? wilt thou take him for a
servant for ever ? Wilt thou play with him
as with a bird ? or wilt thou bind him for thy
maidens ? Shall thy companions make a ban-
quet of him ? shall they part him among the
merchants? Canst thou fill his skin with
barbed irons ? or his head with fish-spears ?
Behold, the hope of him is in vain : shall not
one be cast down even at the sight of him ?
None is so fierce that dare stir him up" (Job
41 : t-io). But he whom no man can take
or bind, the Lamb has in His power, and will

248 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

yet lay hold upon, and fasten with a great
chain, from which he cannot break away. By
the same power with which He upholds the
Fishes He restrains the devouring Enemy ;
and with that same power He will yet fasten
up the monster for final destruction. Of old,
Isaiah prophesied of a day when " the Lord
with His sore and great and strong sword
shall punish Leviathan the piercing Serpent,
even Leviathan that crooked Serpent, and He
shall slay the Dragon that is in the sea " (Isa.
27 : 1). And here we have the same fore-
pictured in the stars, showing how the en-
throned Lamb will bind and punish Leviathan,
even as the written word of prophecy de-
scribes. The sign in the heavens answers
precisely to the descriptions in the Book,
proving that one is of the same piece with the
other, and that both are from the same eter-
nal Spirit which has moved to show us things
to come.

Perseus.
But in still greater vigor and animation is
this whole scene set out in the third accom-
panying side-piece to this sign of the enthroned
Lamb. Micah (2 : 12, 13) prophesies of a time
when the flock of God shall be gathered, their

PERSEUS. 249

King pass before them, and the Lord on the
head of them ; and says that this shall be
when " the Breaker is come up before them."
Whatever may have been in the foreground
of this prediction, it is agreed that " the Break-
er " here must needs be Christ, the very Lamb
of our text, breaking the way of His people
through all the doors and gates of their pres-
ent imprisonment and disability, and dashing
to pieces all the antagonizing powers which
stand in the way of their full deliverance
and redemption. So the Lamb in the Apoc-
alypse is the Breaker of the seals and of apos-
tate nations, the same as the Son in the sec-
ond Psalm. And this Breaker, in these very
acts, is the precise picture in this constel-
lation.

Here is the figure of a mighty man, step-
ping with one foot on the brightest part of
the Milky Way, wearing a helmet on his head
and wings on his feet, holding aloft a great
sword in his right hand, and carrying away
the blood- dripping head of the Gorgon in his
left. His name in the constellation is Perets,
Grsecised Perses or Perseus, the same as in
Micah's prophecy — the Breaker. The name
of the star by his left foot is Atik, He zuho
breaks. The name of the briehtest middle

250 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

star in the figure is Al Genib, the One who
carries away, and Mirfak, Who helps. And
when Perseus comes to the meridian the most
brilliant portion of the starry heavens opens
out its sublimest maenificence in the eastern
hemisphere.

The Myths.
Now, one of the most beloved and admired
of all the hero-gods of mythology was this
Perseus. He was the son of the divine Father,
who came upon Danse in the form of a shower
of eold. No sooner was he born than he and
his mother were put into a chest and cast into
the sea ; but Jupiter so directed that they were
rescued by the fishermen on the coast of one
of the Cyclades, and carried to the king, who
treated them with great kindness, and entrust-
ed to them the care of the temple of the god-
dess of wisdom. His rising genius and great
courage made him a favorite of the gods. At
a great feast of the king, at which the nobles
were expected to make some splendid pres-
ent to their sovereign, Perseus, who was so
specially indebted to the king's favors, not
wishing to be behind the rest or feebler in
his expressions than were his obligations,
engaged to bring the head of Medusa, the

THE MYTHS. 2$ I

only one of the three horrible Gorgons sub-
ject to mortality.

These Gorgons were fabled beings, with
bodies grown indissolubly together and cov-
ered with impenetrable scales. They had
tusks like boars, yellow wings, and brazen
hands, and were very dangerous. Their
heads were full of serpents in place of hair,
and their very looks had power to turn to
stone any one on whom they fixed their gaze.
To equip Perseus for his expedition Pluto
lent him his helmet, which had the power of
rendering the wearer invisible ; and Minerva
furnished him with her buckler, resplendent
as a polished mirror; and Mercury gave him
wines for his feet and a diamond sword for
his hand. Thus furnished, he mounted into
the air, led by the goddess of wisdom, and
came upon the tangled monsters. He,

" In the mirror of his polished shield
Reflected, saw Medusa slumbers take,
And not one serpent by good chance awake ;
Then backward an unerring blow he sped,
And from her body lopped at once her head."

Grasping the same in his left hand, he again
mounted into the air, and

" O'er Lybia's sands his airy journey sped ;
The gory drops distilled as swift he flew,
And from each drop envenomed serpents grew.''

252 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

By this victory he was rendered immortal,
and took his place among the stars, ever
holding fast the reeking head of the Gorgon.
It was on his return from this brave deed that
he saw the beautiful Andromeda chained to
the rock, and the terrible monster of the sea
advancing to devour her. On condition that
she should become his wife, he broke her
chains, plunged his sword into the monster
that sought her life, fought off and turned to
stone the tyrant Phineus who sought to pre-
vent the wedding, and made Andromeda his
bride, begetting many worthy sons and daugh-
ters, and by varied administrations of mirac-
ulous power changing portions of the earth
and its governments and rulers, returning be-
times to bless the countries that honored him.

Perseus and Christ.
No natural events in the seasons or in the
history of man could ever serve as a founda-
tion for such a story as this. Here is a di-
vine-human son, begotten of a golden shower
from the Deity, a child of affliction and perse-
cution from his very birth, but predestined by
the heavenly powers to live and triumph. By
his high qualities he is made the keeper and
conservator of the temple of wisdom and sa-

PERSEUS AND CHRIST. 253

cred worship. Out of devotion to his king
he undertakes to destroy the Gorgons as far
as they are destructible. For this he descends
into hell, and brings forth armor from thence.
He is in communion with the divine wisdom,
and thereby is girded in splendor and led un-
erringly. He is winged, and given a diamond
sword, as Heaven's messenger and herald to
undo the powers of evil and administer deliv-
erance and prosperity. He wounds the dire
Gorgons in the head, and carries off their
power. He punishes Leviathan with his " sore
and great and strong sword." He breaks
the bonds of Andromeda, and makes her his
bride amid high festival, at which he puts
down all opposition. And thereupon he goes
forth to countries far and near, punishing and
expelling tyrants and usurpers, rooting out
untruth and corrupt worship, and blessing
and rejoicing the city and kingdom of heroes.
All this interprets with wonderful literalness
and brilliancy when understood of the prom-
ised Seed of the woman, the Lamb that was
slain, going forward at the head of His people
as the Breaker, brinmnof death and destruction
to the monsters of evil, setting wronged cap-
tives free, and joining them to himself in glory
everlasting. Nor is there anything else of
22

254 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS,

which it will interpret or that can adequately
account for the existence of the story.

Medusa's Head.
And that we are so to understand this fig-
ure is still further manifest in the facts and
names in the reeking, snake-covered head
grasped by the hero. Medusa means the
Trodden wider foot. The name of the prin-
cipal star in this head, Al Ghoul, contracted
into Algol, means the Evil Spirit. The
same is also a variable star, like Mira. It
changes about every three days from a star
of the second magnitude to one of the fourth,
and makes its chancres from one to the other
in three and a half hours. Rosh Satan and
Al Oneh are other names of the stars in this
head, which mean Satan s head, the Weaken-
ed, the Subdued. And the invincible Subduer
and Breaker is none other than " the Lamb,"
the biblical Peretz, the Persian Bershuash, tak-
ing to himself His great power, and enforcing
His saving dominion and authority for the
full redemption of His people.

The Church's Hope.
With great vividness, beauty, and fulness
does this sign of Aries thus symbolize the

THE CHURCH'S HOPE. 2[?5

blessed outcome of the Church, whose earthly
estate and career were signified in the three
preceding. Out of the sacrificial death and
mediation of the Seed of the woman, the
slain Lamb, the Church obtains its being. By
the unfailing stream of the spiritual waters,
which pour down from heaven as the fruit of
His mediatorial intercession, it is quickened
into life and celestial fellowship. By the
bands of royal power with which He has
been crowned at the right hand of eternal
Majesty it is upheld, directed, and governed
amid this sea of earthly existence, turmoil,
danger, and temptation. Helpless in its own
strength, despised, hated, threatened by the
serpents of Medusa's head, and exposed to
the attacks of the monster lord of this world,
it is still sustained and preserved by the right
hand of Him whose is the dominion. And
the time is coming when He who walks amid
the golden candlesticks and holds in His hand
the seven stars shall lift the title-deed of its
inheritance, and call its members up from this
doomed world to meet Him in the air, whilst
He proceeds to punish and dash in pieces all
enemies, cutting off Medusa's head, putting
Leviathan in bonds, and lifting the chained
Andromeda to Cassiopeia's starry throne.

256 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

And then it is that all heaven rings with the
song, " Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, to
receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and
strength, and honor, and glory, and bless-
ing;" whilst all creation thrills with "Bless
ing, and honor, and glory, and power, imtc
Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto
the Lamb for ever and ever."

Dear friends, may I not here turn to ask,
Have you been brought into fellowship and
communion with this Church and congrega-
tion of the Lord ? If so, then thank God for
it, and be glad before Him that He has be-
stowed upon you so great a favor. Bless
His name for the grace that has led you into
those holy gates, and for the treasures and
dignities of which He has thus made you
heirs. Trials, dangers, and disabilities may
be upon you now, but the Lamb is in the
midst of the throne to uphold, protect, and
comfort you, and by His blood and interces
sion you are safe. Cling to Him and His
golden fleece, and no malignity of the De-
stroyer shall ever be able to touch a hair of
your head. Wait and pray on in patience
and in hope ; the victorious Perseus comes
for your deliverance and to share with you
His own triumphant immortality.

THE CHURCH'S HOPE. 2$?

Or does the present moment find you still
lingering without the gates, and far aside
from the assembly and congregation of God's
flock ? These starry lights that look down
so lovingly upon you are hung with admoni-
tions of your danger, and in diamond utter-
ance point you to the better way. " There is
no speech nor language, their voice is not
heard ; but their line is eone out throueh all
the earth, and their words to the end of the
world," marking out the tabernacle of the
Sun of Righteousness, in which alone there
is covenanted safety and salvation for ex-
posed and helpless man. In full harmony
with the written Book night by night they
hold forth their pictorial showings to corrob-
orate the testimony of Prophets and Apostles,
that the erring seed of Adam may learn wis-
dom, enter the chambers of security, and shut
themselves in to life and glory against the
time when the Breaker shall come. The
light-bearers in the sky join with the light-
bearers in the Church in mvine out the one
great testimony of God : " He that believeth
on the Son hath everlasting life ; and he that be-
lieveth not the Son shall not see life ; but the
wrath of God abideth on him" (John 3 : 36).
22* R

ULecture (Sletaeiirt).

THE DAY OF THE LORD.

Is. 92 : 10: " My horn shalt Thou exalt like the horn of an uni-
corn. '

MANY of the Jewish writers and the
Jewish Targum ascribe the author-
ship of this psalm to Adam, the first man.
The Jewish ritual appointed it as the special
psalm for the Sabbath day. It celebrates,
first of all, the glories and blessings of crea-
tion. It then anticipates a period of great
apostasy, wickedness, and prosperity to the
enemies of Jehovah. But beyond that it
contemplates the speedy and invincible over-
throw and destruction of the workers of in-
iquity, followed by a glorious Sabbath of
everlasting righteousness and peace. And
in connection with the violent scattering and
perishing of the enemies of the Lord it par-
ticularly emphasizes a special and peculiar
exaltation of the power and dominion of the
Messiah, who speaks in the Psalmist, and
says that His "horn" — His power, His ac-

258

THE UNICORN, OR RE EM. 259

tive dominion — shall be " like the horn of an
unicorn!'

The Unicorn, or Reem.
It has long been a question what animal
is meant by the Reem, which is so often re-
ferred to in the ancient Scriptures, and which
translators have generally called the unicorn.
But modern research and discovery have
served to clear up the subject in a manner
entirely satisfactory. The reem is not a one-
horned creature, like the rhinoceros, as has
generally been supposed, but a pure animal
of the ox kind, though wild, untamable, fierce,
and terrible. Two passages prove that it
was a great two-horned and mighty creature,
now, so far as known, entirely extinct, but
once common in North-western Asia, As-
syria, and Middle Europe. Remains of it
have of late years been discovered in the
north of Palestine, and Caesar, in the account
of his wars, describes it as being hunted in
the Hercynian forest in his day. It was known
as the primeval ox, or wild bull, different alto-
gether from the bison or the great antelope,
sometimes taken for it. It was a formidable
animal, " scarcely less than the elephant in
size, but in nature, color, and form a true ox."

260 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Its strength and speed were very great, and
it was so fierce that it did not spare man or
beast when it caught sight of them. It was
wholly intractable, and could not be habitu-
ated to man, no matter how young it was
taken. This fact is set out in the book of
Job (39:9-12), where it is said: "Will the
reem be willing to serve thee, or abide by thy
crib ? Canst thou bind the reem with his band
in the furrow ? or will he harrow the valleys
after thee ? Wilt thou trust him because his
strength is great ? or wilt thou leave thy labor
to him ? Wilt thou believe him that he will
bring home thy seed, and gather it into thy
barn ?"

This animal was particularly distinguished
for its great, outspread, sharp, and irresistible
horns, to which the horns of ordinary oxen
were not to be compared. Hence Caesar
says, when a hunter succeeded in killing one,
pitfalls being the chief means of capture, he
made a public exhibition of the horns as the
trophies of his success, and was the wonder
and praise of all who beheld. Joseph (Deut.
33 : 17), in his superiority of power, is likened
to the reem, of which his two sons, Ephraim
and Manasseh, were the two great horns which
were to push the people to the ends of the

THE UNICORN, OR REEM. 26 1

earth. And to this mighty, untamable, and
invincible primeval ox the Messiah compares
himself in connection with the great judg-
ment upon the wicked world ; for then His
horn shall be exalted like the horn of a
reem. Toward His Church He is the Lamb,
but toward the unsanctified world He finally
becomes the terrible reem.

But, what is very marvellous, the picture
which the Messiah appropriates to himself so
exultingly in the text is precisely the picture
which is presented in the sign of the Zodiac
which now comes before us — the sign of Tau-
rus, the first of the final quaternary in the
celestial circle.

I have already explained that the twelve
Zodiacal siens are arranged in three sets of
four each, each set having a particular sub-
ject of its own in the grand evangelic history.
In the first set we were shown the Seed of
the woman in His own personal character
and offices. In the second set we were
shown the formation, career, and destiny of
the Church. And in the third set, upon which
we now enter, we are shown the great judg-
ment-period and the completion of the whole
mystery of God respecting our world and
race.

262 the gospel in the stars,

The Judgment.

I may also remark here that it is a great
mistake to conceive of the judgment-time as
limited to a period of twenty-four hours. It
is called " the day of judgment " only after the
manner in which " the day that the Lord made
the earth and the heavens " is spoken of as a
day. The day of judgment is simply the pe-
riod or time of the judgment. The common
notion on the subject, which crowds up every-
thing in one grand assize, is wholly at vari-
ance with the Scriptures, and a source of end-
less troubles to expositors in attempting to
construe the very numerous and very diverse
prophecies which refer to it. It can be clearly
demonstrated, from the teachings of Christ
and His Apostles, as well as from the ancient
prophets, that everything does not end with
the termination of the present Church period,
and that the end or consummation itself in-
cludes a variety of administrations, in most
of which the glorified saints are to take
active part.

And what is thus set forth in the Scriptures
is correspondingly represented in the signs
as given in the primeval astronomy. Four
of the Zodiacal sierns set forth the career of

THE SIGN OF TAURUS. 2.6$

the Church up to the time of its transfer to
glory, when, under the great power of the
Lamb, the chained and exposed Andromeda
is transformed into the enthroned Cassiopeia.
But beyond that we still have four additional
signs before all is finally complete. These
begin and end with scenes of judgment, and
so relate to a great judgment-period, which
begins at the house of God by the ereption
of God's ready and waiting saints to himself
in the heavenly regions, and then breaks in
fury upon the ungodly population still left
upon the earth. And then it is that Jehovah's
enemies shall perish, and all the workers of
iniquity be scattered, and the horn of the Seed
of the woman be exalted like the horn of the
reem, to fulfil all His desire upon His foes ;
which is the precise scene pictorially repre-
sented in

The Sign of Taurus.
The names of this sign, in Hebrew, Arabic,
Syriac, Latin, and Greek, mean the same as
the English name, the Btdl. But the figure
is not that of the common bull of any known
class. The horns are greater and differently
set from those of domestic cattle, whilst the
toes also have horns. The attitude and en-

264 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ergy displayed are likewise far fiercer and
more nimble than the common ox ever shows.
It is the reem of the text, the aurochs, the bull
of yore, the fierce, mighty, and untamable wild
bull of the primeval ages, and a most expres-
sive symbol of Christ as the irresistible and
angry Judge.

This terrific animal appears here in the in-
tensest rage, dashing forward with swift and
impetuous energy, and with his great sharp
horns set as if to run through everything that
comes in its way. The Egyptians called it by
names signifying the Head, the Captain, the
mighty Chieftain who cometh. The chief star
in this sign is situated in the Bull's eye ; and
its name, Al Debaran, means the Captain,
Leader, or Governor. The middle and hinder
part of the enraged animal includes the body
of the enthroned Lamb, out of which it seems
to rise. It is also the direct opposite of the
Scorpion, so that when it rises the Scorpion
sets and disappears.

The Myths.
In mythology this Bull was always account-
ed snow-white, the color of righteousness and
royal judgment. According to some of the
accounts, this form was assumed by Jupiter

THE MYTHS. 265

out of his passion for the beautiful Europa,
whom he won by his gentleness and bore on
his back across the seas to Crete. The god
of the sea demanded that he should be offered
in sacrifice, but because of his beauty the king
preserved him. Afterward he became mad,
and wrought great havoc and destruction
among the Cretans, and could neither be
caught nor tamed except by Herakles.

This story remarkably interprets with refer-
ence to Christ and His Church, and the anger
with which He is to visit the wicked world
after the Church of the first-born has been
safely landed in heaven. The same becomes
the more striking when we take in some other
markings of the case.

Among the early nations there was a wide-
spread idea connecting this Bull with the Del-
uge, and the Pleiades — the seven stars, the
Doves, the peculiar star-cluster of " sweet in-
fluences"— with the ark of Noah and those
saved by it in that great judgment. "The
seven stars," which the Scriptures also con-
nect with the Church (Rev. i : 16; 2:1), are
on the back of this Bull, high up on his great
shoulder. The Pleiades, according to the
myths, were the seven daughters of Atlas,
the upholder of heaven and earth, who, with

23

266 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

their sisters, the Hyades, in this Bull's head,
were placed in heaven because of their vir-
tues and mutual sympathy and affection.
They beautifully symbolize the saints secure-
ly supported by the terrible Judge, and who.
together with the holy angels whom they are
like, thus move with Him and His inflictions
upon the guilty world.

The Sacred Prophecies.
And when we take this fierce and enraged au-
rochs as the symbol of the glorious Head of His
redeemed people, particularly in those scenes
of judgment upon the apostate and unbeliev-
ing nations after the saints have been taken
away, we have before our eyes in the stars
the very picture which Isaiah describes where
he prophesies of " the world, and all the things
that come forth of it," and says : " The indig-
nation of the Lord is upon all nations, and
His fury upon all their armies. He hath de-
livered them to the slaughter. Their slain
also shall be cast out, and the mountains shall
be melted with their blood. The unicorns \_the
7'eems, the precise animal which constitutes the
figure in Taurus'] shall come down, and the
bullocks with the bulls, and their land shall be
soaked with blood. For it is the day of the

SACRED PROPHECIES, 267

Lord's vengeance, and the year of recompenses
for the controversy of Zion "(34 • 2-8).

The Scriptures everywhere tell us of a pe-
riod of indignation, when the Lord shall come
forth out of His place to punish the inhabitants
of the earth for their iniquity ; when He will
no longer keep silence ; when the earth shall
disclose her blood, and shall no more cover
her slain (Isa. 26: 20, 21). He is very long-
suffering now. Men sin, but His judgment
does not quickly follow upon transgression.
Sin is added upon sin, and wickedness upon
wickedness, and yet the Lord keeps silence,
not willing that any should perish, but that all
should come to repentance. But there is a
limit to His forbearance. There is a time
coming when He will tear in pieces, and there
shall be none to deliver. His own word is :
" Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel
both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the
land desolate, and to destroy the sinners there-
of out of it. And I will punish the world for
their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity ;
and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud
to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of
the terrible. The earth shall remove out of
her place, in the wrath of the Lord of hosts,
and in the day of His fierce anger. Every

268 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

one that is found shall be thrust through "
(Isa. 13).

These are fearful comminations. And
lest we should think that they refer only to
the past, the New Testament repeats them,
and tells us how " the Lord Jesus shall be re-
vealed from heaven with His mighty angels,
in flaming fire taking vengeance on them that
know not God, and that obey not the Gospel "
(2 Thess. 1 : 7-9) ; and how the kings of the
earth, and the great men, and the rich men,
and the .chief captains, and the mighty men,
and every bondman, and every freeman, will
hide themselves in the dens and in the rocks
of the mountains, calling to the mountains
and rocks, " Fall on us, and hide us from the
face of Him that sitteth upon the throne, and
from the wrath of the Lamb: for the great
day of His wrath is come ; and who shall be
able to stand?" (Rev. 6: 12-17). Alas, alas,
for the wicked, the unbelieving, and the im-
penitent when that day comes ! For the horn
of Messiah shall then be like the horn of the
enraged aurochs, and there will be no escape
from His fury.

Orion.
Very impressively also do we find the same

ORION. 269

still further signified in the constellation of
the first Decan of this animated sign. This
is one of the grandest of the constellations,
and so beautifully splendid that when it is
once learned it is never forgotten. When
it comes to the meridian a very magnificent
view of the celestial bodies presents itself
above the horizon. It is specially celebrated
in the book of Job, and is mentioned in Amos
and in Homer. And because of its great
magnificence the flatterers of conquerors like
Nimrod and Napoleon selected it for asso-
ciation with the names of these men.

The figure is a giant hunter, with a mighty
club in his right hand in the act of striking,
and in his left the skin of a slain lion.

" First in rank
The martial star upon his shoulder flames ;
A rival star illuminates his foot ;
And on his girdle beams a luminary
Which in vicinity of other stars
Might claim the proudest honors."

His left foot is in the act of crushing the
head of the enemy. He wears a brilliant
starry girdle to which hangs a mighty sword,
the hilt or handle of which is the head and
body of the Lamb. Concerning the idolatrous
and the wicked, God hath said : " Behold, I
will send for many fishers, and they shall fish

23*

270 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

them ; and after will I send for many hunters^
and they shall hunt them from every moun-
tain, and from every hill, and out of the holes
of the rocks ; for mine eyes are upon all their
ways : they are not hid from my face, neither
is their iniquity hid from mine eyes. I will
recompense their iniquity and their sin double"
(Jer. 16 : 16-18). And here is the great Cap-
tain and Prince of these hunters in full and
mighty action. His name is Orion, He who
cometh forth as light, the Brilliant, the Swift
The book of Job speaks of Him as invin-
cibly girded, whose bands no one can un-
loose. Betelgucse, a star of the first mag-
nitude, flames on His right shoulder; and
Betel ooiese means The Branch coming. Rigel.
another star of the first magnitude, flames in
His lifted foot ; and Rigel means the Foot
that crusheth. In His great belt are three
shining brilliants, called the Three Kings, also
Jacob's Rod (Isa. 11 : 1), also the Ell and Yard,
giving the rule of celestial and righteous meas^
urement, just as it is said of the Rod and
Branch from Jesse's roots, " Righteousness
shall be the girdle of His loins, and faithful-
ness the girdle of His reins" (Isa. 11:5).
In His left breast shines a bright star, Bella-
trix, which means Swiftly coming or Suddenly

MYTHS ON ORION. 2J\

destroying. The Arabs call Him Al Giauza,
the Branch ; Al Mirzam, the Ruler ; Al Nag-
jed, the Prince. He is but another figure of
the same invincible Avenger represented by
the enraofed aurochs — the horn of the Mes-
siah exalted into the horn of the terrible
aurochs.

Myths on Orion.
According to the myths, though full of con
fusion and contradictions, Orion was the united
gift of the gods, Jupiter, Neptune, and Mer-
cury, and had power to walk the sea without
wetting his feet, and surpassed in strength,
stature, and handsomeness all other men.
He is described as the greatest hunter in the
world, who claimed to be able to cope with
and conquer every animal on earth. Because
of this claim, a scorpion sprang up out of the
earth and ofave \{im a m0rtal wound in his
foot ; but at Diana's request he was raised to
immortality, and placed in the heavens over
against the Scorpion. He is spoken of as
skilled in the working and handling of iron,
as havinor fabricated a subterranean abode
for the god of fires, and as having walled in
Sicily against the inundations of the sea,
building thereon a temple to its gods. It is

272 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

said of him that because he loved Merope
her father put out his eyes while he was
asleep on the sea-shore, but that, by raising
himself on the back of a forgeman and turn-
ing his face to the rising sun, he recovered
his sight, and went forth with great haste,
rage, and energy to avenge the perfidious
cruelty of his foes. He is said to have great-
ly loved the Pleiadic maiden, and that out of
affection for her he performed the great work
of clearing the country of all noxious wild
beasts, bringing the spoils of his successes
as presents to his beloved.

There is much rubbish and heathen un
cleanness in some of the accounts, but the
filthy waters nevertheless reflect the pure im-
age. Christ was born of a woman, as some
accounts allege of Orion ; and he was at the
same time the peculiar gift of Deity to our
world, as alleged by other accounts of this
hero of the constellation. He was indeed
the greatest and sublimest of all men. He
did claim to be able to destroy, and came
into the world that He might destroy, all the
mighty powers of evil and all the works of
the Devil. On this account He was stung
by the Scorpion of death. Because of His
love for the Church He did sink into a

E RID ANUS. 273

deep sleep upon these shores of time, in
which the light of His eyes was extinguished,
but was restored to Him again by His lifting
up from the grave. He was in the world, and
passed through it without being wetted or
soiled by its waters. He is indeed stationed
in immortal glory as the everlasting plague,
enemy, and destroyer of death. He it is
wlio has made ready the lake of fire for the
Devil and his angels. He is the Protector of
the land of His Church, and the Builder of
the temple of its worship and security. And
so it is also appointed to Him to come forth
in His mighty power and vengeance, to bring
swift destruction upon His cruel foes, and to
hunt out all the noxious wild beasts that in-
fest the earth, that he may clear it for ever
of their presence, bestowing all the fruits of
His victories upon the Church which He has
purchased with His blood.

Erxdanus.
The second Decan of this illustrious sign
carries forward the same idea to still further
lengths. From beneath the down-coming foot
of Orion, from under the feet of the rampant
aurochs, and from before both, there flows
out a great tortuous river, eastward and west-

274 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS,

ward, and down into the regions of darknes3
in the under-world. Its name is Eridamis, the
River of the Judge. It is specially connected
in the myths with a confusion in the manage-
ment of the chariot of the Sun, by which
heaven and earth were threatened with a
universal conflagration, during which trouble
the vain and obtrusive Phaeton was killed by
a thunderbolt and hurled headlong into this
river, in which his body burned and consumed
with fire, whilst at the same time such burning
heat fell upon the world that it dried up the
blood of the Ethiops and turned vast sections
into sterility and emptiness.

In Daniel's vision of the four beasts, and
of God's judgment of them, we find this same
River of the Judge. Having described the
several world-monsters and their ill-doings,
the Prophet says : " I beheld till the thrones
were set, and the Ancient of days did sit:
His throne was like the fiery flame, and His
wheels as burning fire. *A fiery stream [a river
of tire] issued mid came forth from before him!'
It Is the River of the Judge, for we read, " The
judgment was set, and the books were open-
ed." And the Prophet " beheldxeven till the
beast was slain, and his body destroyed, and
given to the burning flame" (Dan. 7 : 9-1 1).

h RID AN US. 275

So we also read in the Psalms (50 : 3) : " Our
God shall come, and shall not keep silence :
a fire shall devour before Him, and it shall be
very tempestuous round about Him ;" "A fire
goeth before Him, and burnetii up His enemies
round about Him " (97*3—5).

So again in Isaiah it is written : " Behold,
the name of the Lord cometh from far, burn-
ine with His an^er, and the burden thereof is
heavy : His lips are full of indignation, and
His tongue as a devouring fire : and His
breath as an overflowing stream [of fire\.
Tophet is ordained of old ; yea, for the king
it is prepared : He hath made it deep and
large : the pile thereof is fire and much wood ;
the breath of the Lord, like a stream of brim-
stone, doth kindle it" (30:27-33); "For, be-
hold, the Lord will come with fire, and with
His chariots like a whirlwind, to render His
anger with fury, and His rebuke with flames
of fire. For by fire and by His sword will the
Lord plead with all flesh ; and the slain of the
Lord shall be many" (66: 15, 16). "Who
can stand before His indignation ? and who
can abide in the fierceness of his anger ? His
fury is poured out like fire" (Nah. 1 : 5, 6).

And so, also, "when the Son of man shall
sit upon the throne of His glory " the nations

276 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

which did not the works of faith and charity
shall go away "into everlasting fire, prepared
for the Devil and his angels" (Matt. 25 : 31-
41). Nay, saith the holy Apostle, "The day
of the Lord cometh as a thief in the night ; in
the which the heavens shall pass with a great
noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent
heat, the earth also and the works that are there-
in shall be burned" (2 Pet. 3 : 10).

Here, then, is the true Eridanus, and the
fate of the proud and presumptuous Phaeton
and all his usurped rule. The River of Fire,
issuing from before Taurus and Orion, shall
receive them and burn them up in unquench-
able flames. The burning breath of the angry
Judge shall sweep them headlong to " the lake
which burnetii with fire and brimstone, which is
the second death" (Rev. 20: 14, 15).

These are very dark, painful, and terrifying
presentations ; but they are true pictures, ex-
actly the same both in the Scriptures and in
the constellations. They are given in these
alarming terms and figures that wicked, care-
less, and indifferent people may take warning, 4
turn away from their follies and sins, and flee
to the refuse set before us in the blessed Gos-
pel of Christ. And if any man have ears to
hear, let him hear.

MERCY IN JUDGMENT. 2^

But the presentations are not all terror and
hopelessness.

Mercy in Judgment.

Although the present Church-period will
have ended before the promised Seed of the
woman takes on the character described in
the text and in these signs, probation will not
have entirely ended. The possibility of se-
curing salvation will not yet have been com-
pletely cut off. Though the dispensation is
then changed from that of the present silent
forbearance and long-suffering on God's part
into one of active and terrific judgment, and
though all chance of reaching- the first honors
of the kingdom will then have passed away
for ever, there still will be a chance for being
" saved so as by fire ;" and many there will be
who will also embrace that remaining oppor-
tunity.

In the very nature of things the breaking
in of the great and terrible fact that the day
of judgment is come, and with the startling
and convincing proofs of its actual presence
spread all around, there cannot but be some
awakening and revolutionizing effect on the
hearts and thinking of multitudes who up till
then have made themselves very easy about

24

278 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

these matters of salvation. Hence Isaiah
prophesied : "When Thy judgments are in the
earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn
righteousness" (26: 29). So also the Psalm-
ist (64 : 7-9) says : When God shall shoot
His arrows at them that encourage themselves
in evil, and shall suddenly wound them, " men
shall fear, and shall declare the work of God ;
for they shall wisely consider His doing."
And again : " Thy people shall be willing in
the day of Thy power" (110:3). So also
Daniel prophesies of this very time, and says:
" Many shall be purified, and made white, and
tried ; but the wicked shall do wickedly, and
none of the wicked shall understand ; but the
wise shall understand" (Dan. 12 : 8-10). The
wicked shall not understand, seeing, as Paul
says, that because they received not the love
of the truth, God sendeth them a working of
error, that they may believe a lie, and be ir-
remediably condemned (2 Thess. 2:10-12).
Accordingly, we also read in the Apocalypse,
after the ready and waiting saints have been
caught up and crowned in heaven, and the
great tribulation has already set in upon the
earth, of "a great multitude" who were un-
prepared when the first scenes of the judg-
ment broke in, but still succeed in rectifying

A URIGA. 279

their errors, wash their soiled robes in the
blood of the Lamb, and reach the world of
the redeemed, though they never get crowns.
And what we find thus set forth in the Scrip-
tures is likewise signified in the constellations.

Auriga.
To the enraged Aurochs, the mighty Hunt-
er, and the fiery River of the Judge there is
added another figure in the third Decan, which
is thoroughly evangelic and gracious. The
Greek myths are totally at a loss with regard
to its main features, conclusively showing that
these signs were arranged long before the
time of the Greeks, and that Greek genius
was totally incompetent to produce them.
The Greeks could only preserve the tradi-
tional figure in this Decan, and let it stand
wholly unexplained. The figure itself is that
of a mighty man seated on the Milky Way,
holding a band or ribbon in his right hand,
and with his left arm holding up on his shoul-
der a she-goat, which clings to his neck and
looks out in astonishment upon the terrible
Bull ; whilst in his lap are two frightened little
kids, which he supports with his great hand.
The Greeks called him Hceniochos, which in
their language signified a Driver or Chariot-

280 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

eer ; and so our modern atlases call him the
Wagoner. But as he has neither chariot nor
horses, and is thoroughly occupied with the
care of his goats, it is very strange that the
modern world should have persisted in re-
garding him as a chariot-driver. But there
is one link of connection to show how this
absurdity came about. One of the old tradi-
tional names of this figure was Auriga, or a
name framed of the elements preserved in
the word Auriga, which, in Latin, means a
Conductor of the reins, a coachman, a char-
ioteer. And as this figure holds a band or
ribbon in his right hand, these heathen people
could do no better than to take him for a
wonderful charioteer. But he is no char-
ioteer at all, and is engaged in performing
a wholly different office.

The Noetic elements in the word Auriga sig-
nify the Shepherd ; and the Shepherd he really
is, even that same Good Shepherd who laid
down His life for the sheep and giveth unto
them eternal life. This is most clearly shown
by His having the mother-goat on His arm,
with her feet clasped about His neck, and the
little kids on His hand. The band in his
right hand is the same Band which we saw in
the hand of the Lamb and in the hand of the

AURIGA. 28l

enthroned Cepheus. It is the Band of power
by which the glorious Head of the Church
upholds and guides His people on the one
side, and binds the enemy on the other: It
is therefore a picture of the exalted and al-
mighty Saviour, still exercising His offices of
mercy and salvation in the midst of the scenes
of judgment, just as the Scriptures tell us
that in the midst of wrath He remembers
mercy (Hab. 3:2). And to this all the indi-
cations in this sign agree.

The chief star in this constellation, Capella,
which is of the first magnitude and of pecu-
liar brilliancy, marks the heart of the mother-
goat on Auriga's bosom. The very attitude
and expression of this goat are significant. It
not only clings to the great Shepherd's neck,
as if trembling for its own safety, but is anx-
iously looking back upon the action of the
Bull, as if saying, " I have seen the wicked in
great power, and spreading himself like a
green bay tree ; yet he passed away, and, lo,
he is not : yea, I look for him, but he cannot
be found" (Ps. 37 : 34-36). The whole pic-
ture is in precise accord with Isaiah's proph-
ecy of this very period, where he says : " Be-
hold, the Lord will come with strong hand,
and His arm shall rule for Him : behold, His

24*

282 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

reward is with Him and His work before Him.
He shall feed His flock like a shepherd : He
shall gather the lambs with His arm, and carry
them in His bosom, and shall gently lead those that
give suck" (40 : 10, 11). Hence die name of
the star in the right arm of Auriga, Menkal-
inon, in Chaldaic means the Band of the Goats
or Ewes.

In the Zodiac of Dendera, Auriea holds a
sceptre, the upper part of which shows the
head of the Lamb, and the lower part the
figure of the Cross ; which vividly expresses
salvation even under the severe administra-
tions of sovereign judgment. And here are
the two little kids, just born, having come into
place amid these ongoings of the terrible judg-
ment, the one bleating upward after its moth-
er, and the other looking in startled wonder
at the dashing career of the enraged Bull, but
both safe in the great Shepherd's hand. How
touching the picture of the tender mercies of
our Saviour, even after the Church of the first-
born has been taken, and He has already risen
up as the terrible Aurochs !

A Solemn Outlook.
And now what shall we say to these showings
of the Holy Ghost ? There is a day of judg-

A SOLEMN OUTLOOK. 283

ment coming, and it hastens on apace. It will
be a day of trouble and an hour of trial such
as have never yet been seen in our world.
It will be a day that shall burn as an oven ;
and all the proud, yea, all that do wickedly,
shall be as stubble to the fire ; and the day
that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord
of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root
nor branch (Mai. 4:1). Only they that take
refuge in Jesus shall find shelter and security.
And on the throne of His majesty in the
heavens He sits with wide-open arms, saying,
" Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are
heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take
my yoke upon you, and learn of Me ; and ye
shall find rest unto your souls " (Matt. 1 1 :
28, 29). From the eternal Father the word
is : " Unto you that fear my name shall the
Sun of Righteousness arise with healing in
His wings ; and ye shall go forth and grow
up as calves of the stall ; and ye shall tread
down the wicked ; for they shall be ashes un-
der the soles of your feet in the day that I do
this, saith the Lord" (Mai. 4: 2, 3).

How, then, should these presentations serve
to quicken us to spirituality of living and to
all earnestness of watchfulness and prayer,
that we may be found of Him in peace, with-

284 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

out spot, and blameless ! And how should
the same animate our hopes as believers, and
reconcile us to whatever sacrifices, pains, or
losses to which our profession may subject us
in this present evil world ! What saith the
Spirit? Hear it, dear friends, and ponder it:
" Fret not thyself because of evil-doers,
neither be thou envious against the workers
of iniquity ; for they shall soon be cut down
like the grass, and wither as the green herb.
Trust in the Lord, and do good • so shalt thou
dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed.
For evil-doers shall be cut off: but those that
wait upon the Lord, they shall inherit the
earth. For yet a little while, and the wicked
shall not be : yea, thou shalt diligently con-
sider his place, and it shall not be. For
the Lord loveth judgment, and forsaketh not
His saints ; they are preserved for ever.
Wait on the Lord, and keep His way, and He
shall exalt thee to inherit the land : when the
wicked are cut off, thou shalt see it. The sal-
vation of the riehteous is of the Lord : He is
their strength in the time of trouble. And the
Lord shall help them, and deliver them : He
shall deliver them from the wicked, and save
them, because they trust in Him" (Ps. ^).

iLecture &toelftf).

THE HEAVENLY UNION.
I Thess. 4:17: " And so shall we ever be with the Lord."

THESE sweet and comforting words re-
late to a scene of things beyond the res-
urrection of the dead, and hence to something
which is to be brought about during the prog-
ress of the judgment-period. After the Lord
himself has come forth with the voice of a
great trumpet, and the holy dead have been
raised, and the living saints have been trans-
lated, and both classes have been caught up to-
gether to meet the Saviour in the air, then the
word is, "So shall we ever be with the Lord!'
And the particular blessedness which we thus
find set forth in the Scriptures we also find in
the constellations, and more especially in that
sien of the Zodiac which we now come to con-
sider — Gemini, usually called The Twins.

The Sign of Gemini.
We have here two youthful-looking and

285

286 THE GOSPEL EV THE STARS.

most beautiful figures peacefully sitting to-
gether, with their feet resting on the Milky
Way. Their heads lean against each other
in a loving attitude. The one holds a great
club in his right hand, whilst his left is clasped
around the body of his companion. The other
holds a harp in one hand and a bow and arrow
in the other. Both the club and the bow and
arrow are in repose, the same as the figures
which hold them. The club, unlifted, lies
against the shoulder of the one, and the bow,
unstrung, rests in the hand of the other. The
picture looks like a readiness for warlike ac-
tion, but at the same time like a joyful repose
after a great victory already gained. We will
presently see that it really means all that it
seems, and that it significantly portrays what
is set forth in the text and in many places in
the Scriptures.

Mythic Accounts.
The Greeks and Romans considered these
two figures the representatives of two youths,
twin brothers, both sons of Jupiter, of very
peculiar and extraordinary birth. They are
said to have been with the Argonauts in the
contest for the Golden Fleece, on which oc-
casion they displayed unparalleled heroism —

MYTHIC ACCOUNTS. 287

the one by achievements in arms and person-
al prowess, and the other in equestrian exer-
cises. In the Grecian temples they were rep-
resented as mounted on white horses, armed
with spears, riding side by side, crowned with
the cap of the hunter tipped with a glittering
star. The belief was, that they often appear-
ed at the head of the armies, and led on the
troops to battle and victory — the one mounted
on a fiery steed, the other on foot, but both as
invincible warriors. After their return from
Colchis it is said that they cleared the Helles-
pont and the neighboring seas from pirates
and depredators, and hence were honored as
the particular friends and protectors of navi-
gation. An intimation of this is given in the
history of St. Paul, as the name of the vessel
in which he sailed was that of these two fig-
ures. It is further said that flames of fire were
betimes seen playing around their heads, and
that when this occurred the tempest which
was tossing the ocean ceased, and calm en-
sued. They were said to have been initiated
into all the mysteries, and were invited guests
at a great marriage at which a severe conflict
occurred. They were indissolubly attached
to each other, and Jupiter rewarded their mu-
tual affection by transferring them together

288 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

to heavenly immortality. The Greeks and
Romans sacrificed white lambs upon their
altars, and held them in very high regard. It
was a common thing to take oaths by their
names, as indicative of the utmost truth and
verity. Vulgarly, the habit still survives of
swearing "by Gemini."

Further accounts represent these two youths
as kings, and as divine saviors and helpers of
men, though mostly in the character of warrior-
judges. They were supposed to preside over
the public games, particularly where horses
were concerned. War-songs and dances were
supposed to have originated with them, and
they had much to do in favoring and inspiring
the bards and poets. When Menestheus was
endeavoring to usurp the government of Atti-
ca, they interfered, and devastated the country
around Athens until its gates opened to them
and the Athenians submitted to them and ren-
dered them sacred honors. They were dis-
tinguished in the Calydonian Hunt, and fought
and slew Amycus, the gigantic son of the god
of the sea, who challenged the Argonauts
and had shown himself the enemy of Herakles.
They made invasive war to recover the por-
tions of which they had been cunningly cheat-
ed, and succeeded in it, and chained much more

MYTHIC ACCOUNTS. 289

In addition. In this conflict the authors of the
murderous assaults upon them were stricken
down and slain by the lightnings of Jupiter.
They were assigned great power over good
fortune, and particularly over the winds and
the waves of the sea.

Such are the mythic representations as they
come through the Greeks and Romans. In
some other showings, however, these two
figures are not of one sex. In the Zodiac
of Dendera the figure is that of a man walk-
ine hand in hand with a woman. The same
are sometimes called Adam and Eve. But
the male figure is not the literal first Adam,
but the mystic second Adam, the same Seed
of the woman who everywhere appears in
these celestial frescoes. The figure in the
Egyptian sphere has an appendage which sig-
nifies the Coming One — the Messiah-Prince
And having identified the masculine figure,
there can be no difficulty in identifying the
accompanying female figure. The Lamb has
a bride, a wife, bone of His bone and flesh
of His flesh, and destined for an everlasting
union with Him in glory and dominion. And
this Eve, made out of His side in the deep
sleep of death to which He submitted for the
purpose, is none other than the Church, which

25 T

29O THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

here appears in celestial union with her sublime
Lord. Even the word Gemini, in the original
Hebrew, Arabic, and Syriac, whence it has
come, does not run so much on the idea of
two brought forth at the same birth, as upon
the idea of something completed, as of a year
come to the full or as of a long betrothal
brought to its consummation in perfected
marriage. The old Coptic name of this sign,
Pi Alahi, signifies the United, the Completely
joined.

The Star- Names.
And when we closely examine the names
still retained in this constellation, we find
ample indication that these figures were
meant to set forth Christ and His Church
in that ereat marriage-union which is to be
completed in the heavens during that very
judgment-period to which these last four
signs refer. In the left foot of the southern
figure of Gemini shines a conspicuous star,
named Al Henah, the Hurt, the Wounded.
This figure, then, must refer to Him whose
heel was to be bruised. So the principal star
in his head is called Pollux, the Ruler, the
Judge, and sometimes Her aides, or Hercules %
the mighty sufferer and toiler, who frees the

THE STAR-NAMES. 2QI

world of ail otherwise unmanageable powers
of evil. In the centre of his body is another
bright star, called Wasat, which means Set,
Seated, or Put in place, as where it is said, " I
am set on the throne of Israel," " there are set
thrones of judgment," " the judgment was set"
" I am set in my ward ;" which specially de-
scribes what is prophesied of Christ in con-
nection with the completion of His marriage
with His Church.

And, in perfect accord with these indica-
tions, this figure holds in his right hand the
great club of power, as the One who bruises
the Serpent's head and breaks in pieces all
antagonisms to His rule or to His people's
peace. The Egyptians called him Hor, or
Horns, the Coming One, the son of light, the
slayer of the serpent, the recoverer of the
dominion. Horus is described in an extant
Egyptian hymn as " the son of the sun," " the
mighty, the great avenger, the observer of
justice," " the golden hawk coming for the
chastisement of all lands, the divinely benef-
icent, the Lord omnipotent;" which corre-
sponds again with the descriptions of the
Merodach of the ancient Babylonians, who is
called the Rectifier, the great Restorer. It is
the biblical description, almost literally, of the

2Q 2 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

promised Redeemer of the world in connec-
tion with the judgment.

The variation as to the sex of the other
figure, which is sometimes contemplated as
a woman and sometimes as a masculine hero,
corresponds also with the biblical representa-
tions of the Church. God calls Israel His
son, and also His spouse, the wife of which
He is the Husband, the one chosen out from
among the maidens and wedded to himself.
The bride of the Lamb in the Apocalypse is
at the same time described as "a man-child"
who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron,
and to that end was " caught up unto God and
to His throne."

Christ's Union with His Church.
But the two figures in this sign, though in
some sense distinct, are really one, as Christ
and the Father are one, and as the man and
his wife are one flesh. The union is such
that one is in the other, and the two are so
conjoined that one implies and embraces the
other. There is no Christ apart from His
Church, and there is no Church except in
Christ. They are two, and yet they are one
— He in them, and they in Him — so that what
is His is theirs, and what is theirs is His. As

CHRIST'S UNION WITH HIS CHURCH 293

He is the peculiar Son of God, they are pecu-
liar sons of God in Him, and are joint-heirs
with Him to all that He inherits. Again and
again the Scriptures comprehend Him in the
descriptions of the Church, and embrace them
in the predictions concerning Him. Hence,
in the truer and deeper meaning of the Psalms,
He and His people speak the same words,
pass through the same experiences, receive
the same assurances, and rejoice in the same
promises, hopes, and honors. The king often
disappears in the body politic, and the body
politic still oftener disappears in the king.
And so it is in these two figures. They are
no more twins than Christ and His Church
are twins, yet they are both the peculiar sons
of God ; whilst the birth of the one was vir-
tually and really the birth of the other.

Hence, also, the names and qualities which
appear in the one are at the same time con-
sumable with both, because they coexist in
one another. They are Bridegroom and
bride, but they are at the same time together
the one Man-Child appointed to rule all na-
tions with a rod of iron. Accordingly, the
one is called Pollux and Herakles — the Ruler,
the Judge, the Toiling Deliverer; and the
other is called Castor and Apollo — the Coming

25*

294 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Ruler or Judge, " born of the light," who pun-
ishes and destroys the wicked and unright-
eous, who brings help and wards off evil, whc
has the spirit of prophecy and sacred song,
who protects and keeps the flocks, and who
deliehts in the founding and establishment of
cities, kingdoms, and settled rule and order
among men. It is not the one by himself in
either case, but the one in and with the other,
conjoined and perfected in the same admin-
istration— Christ with the Church, and the
Church with Christ, as the one all-ruling Man-
Child under whom the whole earth shall be
delivered from misrule and oppression, the
eternal kingdom come, and the entire world
enjoy its unending Sabbath.

At present this union of Christ with His
Church, though real and the very life of Chris-
tianity, is mystic, hidden, and not yet fully re-
vealed. The Church is yet intermixed and
held down by earthiness and the power of
mortality and death. All this needs to be
stripped off and immortality put en, as has
been accomplished in the case of Christ the
Head, who is now already at the right hand
of the Father. What has happened in His
deliverance, triumph, and exaltation needs
also to be wrought out in the case of His

THE MARRIAGE OF THE LAMB. 295

members, the Church. Our complete union
with Him can only be when this mortal has
put on immortality and death is swallowed up
of life ; which occurs when the sainted dead
are raised, and they, together with those of
His who are then still alive, are caught up in
incorruption to meet Him in the heavenly
spaces. But what is as yet mystic and unre-
vealed is hereafter to be openly, formally, and
most gloriously exhibited and shown in living
and eternal fact

The Marriage of the Lamb.
Hence, in the Apocalyptic pictures of the
ongoing judgment-period, after the Man-Child
has been born into immortality, and is caught
up to God, and has overcome the opposing
Dragon and his angels by the blood of the
Lamb and the word of their testimony, and
immediately before Christ and His people
come forth riding on white horses for the
overthrow of the Beast and his armies, we
hear the voice of gladness and rejoicing, and
the giving of glory to the All-Ruler, in that
"the Marriage of the Lamb is come'" and the
word of blessing goes forth upon all who are
" called to the marriage-supper of the Lamb "
(Rev. 19 : 7-9).

296 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Just what this marriage of the Lamb is, or
what celestial formalities and demonstrations
it embraces, no man is able definitely to tell.
We know, in general terms, that the Bride-
groom is Christ, after He has taken to Him
His great power and is about to proceed to
the utter destruction of His enemies, and that
the bride is the Church, the completed assem-
bly of the elect, after they have all been gath-
ered to their Lord in triumphant immortality.
We know also that it involves some formal
and manifest ceremonial, by which He takes,
acknowledges, and fully endows His glorified
Church as thenceforward and for ever con-
joined with himself in closest and inseparable
unity, to move as He moves, to reign as He
reigns, to judge and make war as He judges
and makes war, and to be one with Him in all
the possessions, administrations, joys, honors,
and achievements which pertain to Him then
and world without end. It is the formal and
eternal perfecting of them in Him, and of
Him in them, in a union as ineffable as it is
unendine.

And this is the precise thing alluded to in
the text and pictorially given in the sign of
Gemini. The very name, the attitudes of the
figures, and the order of place occupied by

THE MARRIAGE OF THE LAMB. 297

this sien, as well as the star-names in it and
all the mythic stories connected with it, com-
bine to fix this as its truest and fullest mean-
ing, as intended by the mind that framed it
and gave out the original instructions con-
cerning it. It is God's sign in the heavens
of the coming marriage and union of the Seed
of the woman with His redeemed Church, pre-
cisely as the same is set forth in all His word
as the hope and joy of His people, to be ful-
filled at His revelation and coming.

Thus, then, we find the true Castor and
Pollux, the peculiar sons of God, whose bra-
very secures the prize of the Golden Fleece,
who share in the same trials, sufferings, labors,
triumphs, and glories, and with whom is the
holy wisdom, the prophetic inspiration, the
leadership of armies that fight for human
rights and liberty, the patronage of holy hero-
ism and sacred song, the upholding of truth
and righteousness, the only salvation for op-
pressed and afflicted man. These are the
true kings, ordained to rule all nations with
a rod of iron, to chastise and destroy the re-
bellious and incorrigible, to hunt out and pun-
ish wickedness unto the ends of the earth,
and to be revealed in flaming fire as warrior-
judges on white horses, to put down usurpers,

298 the gospel in the stars.

fight the gigantic son of the god of this world,
hurl the dread Antichrist and his hordes to
sudden perdition, revenge the blood of mar-
tyrs on those who shed it, apportion law and
destiny to the earthly peoples, and sit and
reign in immortal regency over all the after
generations. (See my Lectures on the Apoc-
alypse, vol. iii.)

And what we thus find in the siom is further

o

signified in the accompanying Decans.

Lepus.
The first of these, as given in our plani-
spheres, is Lepus, the figure of a gigantic
hare. In the Arabic it is called Arnebeth,
which means the Hct7'e, but also has the sig-
nification of Enemy of the Coming. In the Per-
sian and Egyptian Zodiacs the figure is a
serpent^ trodden under Orion's foot, with this
further addition in the Egyptian, that the ser-
pent is also caught in the claws of a seeming
hawk. It is also called Bashti-Beki, the Offend-
er confounded. The mythic account of this hare
is, that it is one of the animals which Orion
most delighted in hunting, and hence was
placed near him in the stars. In the picture
Orion is in the act of crushing this hare with
his great foot. And the names of the stars

SIK1US. 299

which it includes — Nibal, Rakis, and Sugia —
mean the Mad, the Caught, the Deceiver.

From these indications it is sufficiently man-
ifest that this constellation was meant to show
and record the nearing end of the Enemy, and
the close proximity of his utter overthrow when
once the heavenly marriage is celebrated.

And this is precisely the showing made in
the Scriptures, particularly in the Apocalypse.
The lifting- of the Church into its destined
union with Christ in glory is a stunning blow
to the whole empire of darkness, and the sure
herald of its utter dissolution then speedily to
follow. No sooner is it announced that " the
marriage of the Lamb is come " than the
heaven opens, and He who is called Faithful
and True rides forth upon the white horse,
in righteousness to judge and make war, and
all the armies of heaven follow Him on white
horses, and the. Beast and the False Prophet
are taken, and the kings of the earth and their
armies are slain with the sword of this invin-
cible host (Rev. 19 : 6-21).

Sirius.
The second Decan confirms and sustains
the same presentation. This is the great
Dog, anciently the Wolf, the special hunter

300 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

and devourer of the hare. In the Dendera
Zodiac the figure is the Eagle or Hawk, the
particular enemy of the Serpent, having on
his head a double mark of crownings with
power and majesty, and standing on the top
of a great mace as the triumphant royal
Breaker and Bruiser of the powers of evil.
The principal star in this constellation is the
most brilliant and fiery in all the heavens.

" All others he excels ; no fairer light
Ascends the skies, none sets so clear and bright."

But it is associated with burning heat, pesti-
lence, and disaster to the earth and the chil-
dren of men. Homer sung- of it as a star

" Whose burning breath
Taints the red air with fevers, plagues, and death."

Virgil speaks of blighted fields, a smitten
earth, and suffering beasts, because this star

" With pestilential heat infects the skv."

This star is called Sirius, from Sir or Seir,
which means Prince, Guardian, the Victorious.
Taken in connection with the name of the
figure in the Egyptian sphere, as often given,
we have Naz-Seir or Nazir ; and we know
who it was that was to be called Naz-seir-ene.
Naz-Seir means the Sent Prince. So the Rod

sixius. 301

promised to come forth from the stem or
stump of Jesse is called Netzer in the He-
brew Bible, there translated the Branch, the
princely Scion, who should " smite the earth
with the rod of His mouth, and slay the
wicked with the breath of His lips." Not,
then, only because Christ spent His earlier
years at an obscure little village by the name
of Nazareth, but, above all, because He was
the Sent Prince, the Messiah, the Branch, at
once the Netzer of Isaiah and the Naz-Seir
of these equally prophetic constellations.
From the earliest ages of Christianity till
now interpreters and defenders of the Scrip-
tures have been at a loss to explain by what
prophet or in what sacred prophecy it was
said, as claimed by the Apostle, that Christ
should be called a Nazarene ; but here, from
a most unexpected quarter, we find the near-
est and most literal foreshowing of that very
name, given in place as a designation of the
Seed of the woman, and describing Him as
the Sent Prince, the lordly Eagle, the appoint-
ed tearer in pieces and extirpator of the
whole serpent brood. And in this Naz-Seir,
or Naz-Sirius, we are to see Him of whom
Matthew said, " He came and dwelt in a city
called Nazareth, that it might be fulfilled

26

302 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

which was spoken by the prophets, He shall
be called Naz-Seir-ene" (Matt. 2 ; 23).

In accord with this, the second star of this
constellation is called Mirzam, the Ruler ; the
third, Muliphen, the Leader, the Chieftain;
the fourth, Wesen, Shining, Illustrious, Scarlet;
the fifth, Adhara, the Glorious ; and another,
Al Habor, the Mighty. It would verily seem
as if we were selecting a list of scriptural ex-
pressions concerning our Redeemer when we
thus give the sense of these astronomic names.
Their meaning is most truly significant when
understood of Christ, but they are worse
than absurd if we are to understand them
of an Egyptian dog. Nor will these show-
ings interpret at all except as applied to the
scene, subject, and period of which Gemini,
as I have explained, is the central sign.

The Sublime Prince.
A magnificent picture of the Sun is that
which the Psalmist gives, where he repre-
sents him as a bridegroom, glowing under
his wedding-canopy, exulting like a mighty
man to run his race, and going forth from
one horizon to the other with a power of
heat and brightness from which nothingr can
hide. But what is thus said of the natural

THE SUBLIME PRINCE. 303

Sun is still more thrillingly true of the Sun
of Righteousness in the case before us. He
is the Bridegroom, for " the marriage of the
Lamb is come." He stands under the wed-
ding-canopy, the Illustrious, the Glorious,
ready for revelation in the brightness of His
appearing, and exulting to go forth in all His
invincible energy to search and try the earth
from end to end, revealing everything, test-
ing everything, and bringing burning, death,
and destruction to whatever is found lifting1

o

itself against Him as " the King- of kines and
Lord of lords."

In this attitude and in these relations He is
the Hunter and Destroyer of the Hare, the
true Naz-Seir-ene, the Appointed Prince, the
lordly Eagle, the Destroyer of the Serpent.
Here especially He is the mighty, the glori-
ous, the Prince of the right hand, as the Ar-
abic has it, the Chief leading His hosts to
effective victory. Here heat and burning
and plague and death attend upon His going
forth, and men are smitten and scorched ; as
it is written : " Their flesh shall consume
away while they stand upon their feet, and
their eyes shall consume away in their sock-
ets, and their tongue shall consume away in
their mouth" (Zech. 14:12); "for the day

304 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

of the Lord of hosts shall be upon every one
that is proud and lofty, and upon every one
that is lifted up, and the loftiness of man
shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness
of men shall be made low, and the Lord
alone shall be exalted in that day" (Isa. 2 :
12-17) ' "And out of His mouth goeth a
sharp sword, that with it He should smite the
nations ; and He shall rule them with a rod
of iron ; and He treadeth the winepress of
the fierceness of the wrath of Almighty God"
(Rev. 19: 15).

It is the same picture of the same identical
scene described by Isaiah (63), where it is
asked, " Who is this that cometh from Edom,
with dyed garments from Bozrah ? this that
is glorious in his apparel, travelling in the
greatness of his strength ?" To which He
answers : " I that speak in righteousness,
mighty to save." And where the further
inquiry is put : " Wherefore art thou red in
thine apparel, and thy garments like him that
treadeth thewinefat?" And the further an-
iwer is : "I have trodden the winepress alone ;
and of the people there was none with me :
for I will tread them in mine anger, and
trample them in my fury; and their blood
shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I

THE COMPANION OF SIRIUS. 305

will stain all my raiment For the day of
vengeance is in mine heart, and the year of
my redeemed is come. . . . And I will tread
down the people in mine anger, and make
them drunk in my fury, and I will bring down
their strength to the earth." Here is the
true Polhix, the real Sirius, the mighty Chief-
tain, the Wolf or Eagle coming upon the
enemy, the glorious Hero of salvation, ar-
rayed in brightness and scarlet, and triumph-
ing in the greatness of His strength.

All the features in the sien thus harmoni-
ously weave into one consistent and magnifi-
cent showing, which is the same in the stars
as in the written prophecies.

The Companion of Sirius.
But when the elorious Sun of Riehteous-
ness thus comes forth in His majesty from
under the wedding-canopy, " clothed with a
vesture dipped in blood," riding upon the
white horse, and sending out His mighty
sword to smite the nations and hurl the
Beasts and their followers to perdition, He
comes not alone. The armies of the heaven
follow Him on white horses, wearing the clean
linen of saintly righteousness. He is the
Head, the Leader, the Chief, but behind Him

26* U

306 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

are His elect myriads, warrior-judges like
himself. He is married now, and His bride
is with her Husband. " To execute ven-
geance upon the nations and punishments
upon the people ; to bind their kings with
chains, and their nobles with fetters of iron ;
to execute upon them the judgment written :
this honor have all the saints" (Ps. 149 : 7—9).

And to bring out this feature there is added
a third Decan of Gemini — the second Dogr
or Wolf. It differs from the first only in be-
ing smaller and feebler, and following a little
behind the first ; for the saints by this time
are all like unto their Lord, and follow Him
whithersoever He goeth. Princeliness is in
them also, though the Arabic astronomy des-
ignates them as the Prince of the left hand,
as it calls Him the Prince of the ri^ht hand.
In the Egyptian Zodiac this constellation has
a human figure with the Eagle's head ; hence
a sign of humanity exalted to power and au-
thority against the Serpent-seed. It is called
Sebak — that is, Conquering, Victorious.

The name of the principal star, a very
bright star of the first magnitude — and from
that star the name of the constellation itself
on our planispheres — is Procyon, which, in its
Noetic elements, is associated in meaning

THE MYTHS. 307

with redemption, and may mean Redeemed or
Redeeming, or both, and well describes the
body of the glorified saints. The term Al
Mirzam occurs here also, as in the second
Decan, and ascribes rulership to what is here
symbolized, the same as to the Head Prince
going before ; just as Christ has promised to
His faithful people that they shall share His
throne and sovereignty and " reign with Him
for ever and ever." The second star in this
constellation bears the name of Al Gomeiza,
which in signification also refers to redemp-
tion, and seems to include particularly the
previous history of the saints, as, like their
Lord, once burdened, loaded dozen, enduring
for the sake of others.

The Myths.
The myths touching this Dog are varied.
Some say he represents the Egyptian god
Anubis, which was the god that took charge
of the dying and carried them to judgment
Others say it refers to Diana and her hunt-
ing and destroying of wild beasts. Some
say he is the dog of Icarus, who revealed
the place where the murderers of his master
had hid the body of their victim, and thus
was the occasion of various sad and disturb-

308 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ing calamities. And still other accounts rep-
resent this Dog as one of the hounds of
Actaeon, which in madness devoured their
master after Diana had turned him into a
stag. Actaeon was a trained and cunning
hunter who was impertinent toward Artemis,
the goddess of purity and justice, and had
command over sufferings, plagues, and death.
He boasted himself against her, and even
appropriated to himself and associates what
was sacred to her. Hence these judgments
came upon him and made an end of him.

These stories agree in nothing except in
the recognition of some good agency or
heavenly power at work to bring the erring
to account, and to give trouble and death to
the proud, the offending, and the intractable.
But in this they all accord with the character
and office which the Scriptures ascribe to the
glorified Church in connection with what fol-
lows immediately on the marriage of the
Lamb. They help to strengthen the chain
of evidence identifying Procyon as the starry
symbol of those heavenly armies which come
forth along with the King of kings and Lord
of lords to the battle of the great day of God
Almighty, to make an end of misrule and
usurpation on earth, and clear it of all the

SUMMARY ON GEMINI. 309

wild beasts which have been devastating it
for these many ages.

Summary on Gemini.
Thus, then, the records in the stars com-
bine with the records in the Book to picture
to us a most sublime destiny for the congre-
gation of believers. They are betrothed to
Christ even now, and love Him, and oft have
sweet and blessed communion with Him ; but
it is only through veils and intervening ordi-
nances, by faith and not by sight. The time
is coming when these veils shall be removed,
and God's people shall meet Him face to
face, and see tne King in His beauty, and be
joined with Him in all the intimacies of love,
fellowship, and oneness, being made copart-
ners with Him in all He has and is and does,
yea, the loved and loving participants in all
His glory, throne, and immortal administra-
tions. They shall not only " stand in the
judgment," but they shall be lifted when it
comes, " caught up to meet the Lord in the
air," to be with Him as no other beings are
with Him, even as His bride and wife. And
when His power goes forth to plague the
wicked world, avenge the blood of the mar-
tyrs, overwhelm the great Beast and hi.

3IO THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

armies, rid the world of all the wild beasts
of usurpation and unrighteousness which
have infested it so long, and reduce the re-
fractory nations and peoples to just and right-
ful authority by the force of an iron sceptre
to which all must bow or be dashed to pieces,
they shall be one with Him in the terrific
manifestations and be co-administrants of
that irresistible almightiness. They in Him,
and He in them, shall be the Castor and
Pollux of the world to come, supremely bless-
ed in each other, and making blessed, putting
glad songs where tears and groans have
moaned their miserere, and settling every-
thing into the order, peace, and permanence
of that divine kingdom when all shall be " on
earth as it is in heaven."

O glorious outcome for these toils and fears
and trials and misgivings in faith's weary pil-
grimage ! Death gone ! Mortality swallowed
up of life ! Union with the King complete !
Vicissitude, peradventure, doubt, and disabil-
ity clean swept away for ever ! The throne,
the dominion, and the glory secure ! What
a blessedness is this ! Who shall sing it as
it merits ?

" Blest seats ! through rude and stormy scenes
I onward press to you."

Eecftire ©Ijtrtemtij.

THE BLESSED POSSESSION.

Gen 22 : 17 : "I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven,
and as the sand which is upon the sea-shore ; and thy seed shall pos-
sess the gate of his enemies."

THIS is part of the oath which God swore
unto Abraham after the test of his faith
in the offering of his son Isaac. It applied
in part to the believing patriarch's natural
seed, but more especially to Christ and the
multitudinous seed of faith, who are also
u the seed of Abraham." This is made clear
in the writings of St. Paul, who tells us that
" to Abraham and his seed were the promises
made ; not to seeds, as of many, but as of
one — thy Seed — which is Christ" (Gal. 3:16);
"and if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's
seed, and heirs according to the promise"
(Gal. 3 : 29).

We do not therefore strain or misapply the
text when we understand it of Christ and the
Church, and say that to these the divine prom-
ise is to multiply them as the stars of the

311

312 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

sky and the sands on the sea-shore, and to
give them victory and success to take the
gate of their enemies, and possess the same
for ever. And the ultimate fulfilment of this
promise is what we find symbolized in the
stars by the sign of Cancer and the constel-
lations which form its Decans.

The Sign of Cancer.
In our planispheres we have here the pic-
ture of a gigantic Crab. It is the same in the
Parsi, Hindoo, and Chinese Zodiacs, and hence
is supposed to have been the same in the
Chaldean and original representations ; but
in the Egyptian sphere the figure is the Sca-
rabceus, or sacred beetle, which some take as
having been the original figure. It is diffi-
cult to decide which is the most ancient, but
either serves well to express the meaning
which clearly attaches to this sign.

The Crab.
The crab is an animal born of the water,
as the Church is "born of water and of the
Spirit." Its rows of legs, on opposite sides,
give the idea of multitudinous development
and numerous members, as the promise here
is with regard to the Church, and as is signi-

THE CRAB. 313

fied in the sign of the Fishes, which is a spe-
cial symbol of the Church.

In the progress of the crab's development
and growth it undergoes important changes.
The most marked of these is the periodic
throwing off of its old shells and the taking on
of new ones. In its earlier life these changes
involve alterations in the whole form and
shape of the animal. And so the Church, in
the process of its earthly development and
growth, passes from dispensation to dispensa-
tion, and each individual saint first puts off the
old man with his deeds, and puts on the new
man which is renewed after the image of
Him that created him, and then lays off " the
body of this death " in order to be " clothed
upon with our house which is from heaven,
that mortality might be swallowed up of life."
And these several changes, both general and
personal, are all entirely completed by the
time the Church comes to occupy the place
indicated by this sign.

The crab is also armed with two powerful
hands or claws, by which it grasps hold with
wonderful force and securely retains what-
ever it takes. And so it is with the people
of God. Having, like Mary, " chosen the
good part," or, like the patriarchs, " embraced

27

314 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

the promises," or, like the apostles, " lain hold
of the hope set before us," they come into
the possession of the incorruptible and heav-
enly inheritance, and retain it with a grasp so
firm and strong that it " shall not be taken
away."

The Scarab^us.
And so again with the scarab&us. This is
a creature whose career exhibits very marked
and significant transformations. The first
period of its existence is passed in a dark,
drear, subterranean abode, where its senses
are feeble, its powers circumscribed, unglad-
dened by pleasant sights, oft terrified by un-
intelligible voices from the sunlit world above,
compelled to eat and live amid filth, and with
no worthier employment than to grow and
wait for future changes. And so it is with
the earthly Church and the children of God in
this present life. With all that may be said
of us here, we are the slaves of toil and suf-
fering, full of darkness, doubt, and uncertain-
ty, loaded with grovelling cares, the sport of
ever-recurring accidents which we cannot ex-
plain, pushed and cramped and crowded by
others no better off than ourselves — mere
knots of incapacities and troubles like earth-

THE SCARAB^US. 315

born and dirt-fed grubs, though bearing in us
the germs and beginnings of eventual glory
and blessedness.

Having dragged out the time apportioned
to its first condition, the scarabaeus is next
transformed into quite another. Nature's
hand now swaths it into a chrysalis. Ac-
tivity ceases. Food can no longer be taken.
The avenues of the senses are closed. The
functions of life are put in abeyance, though
soon to open out into still another form of
existence. And so our earthly life terminates
in death and passes into the mummy con-
dition— that peculiar middle stage in which
our inner being still lives on, but in quies-
cence and rest, which the Scriptures call
" sleep," which no cares or wants invade, and
in which the embalmed body awaits the call
of resurrection to reappear with new and
augmented powers.

And when this period of peaceful inaction
is completed the swathed creature suddenly
breaks from its chrysalis, and bursts forth
into an exaltation of being- which has for ever
left behind it every vestige of the low con-
ditions in which its earlier life was spent.
What painfully and gloomily crawled in the
filthy earth and darkness now spurns the

316 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

dust, takes wings like a bird, soars at large
in the bright sunshine whithersoever it will,
and becomes a dweller in air, with the liber-
ties of a free heaven. Filled now with lov-
ing affections and marvellous sagacity, it
builds a house for its treasure, and holds it
fast as it rolls it out with unwearied devotion
into the vast unknown. And thus from the
mummy form of the sleeping saints there is
to come a sudden bursting forth, when bodies
terrestrial shall be supplanted by bodies celes-
tial, and what was earthy becomes heavenly,
and what was corruptible puts on in corrup-
tion, and what was ignoble becomes glorious,
and what was natural takes all the attributes
and capacities of enfranchised spiritual being,
to mount up with wings as eagles, and to en-
joy the light and love and liberty of heaven,
in no way inferior to the angels. And thus,
with the goal of our being reached and the
treasure of our hearts in hand, the promise
is that we shall hold it secure world without
end.

There was scarce a creature on earth which
the old Egyptians made so much of as this
scarabaeus beetle. The stones of their finger-
rings and shoe-latchets, the seals of their
priests and nobles, the ornaments and amu-

PR&SEPE. 317

lets worn on their bodies, the tokens of their
guilds and orders, the memorials of their
marriages, and the last mark put upon the
mummies of their dead, were shaped into the
form of the scarabseus. Men have wondered
why this was, and faulted the taste of people l
so attached to a filthy bug. It was not on ac-
count of its beauty surely, nor on account of
any great service rendered by it to their
country or their crops. But it was the figure
in their Zodiac — the star-sign of perfected
being, the progress of which from darkness
to light, from death to resurrection, from
earthly disability to heavenly glory, from the
vicissitudes of time to the secure possession
of the treasures of eternity, they could see
and trace in this beetle at almost every step
throughout all their land, and with which the
primitive traditions had taught them to con-
nect the most precious hopes of man. This
explains the mystery and tells the story, and
helps us greatly in identifying the meaning
which the primeval patriarchs understood
and intended to express in this eleventh sign
of the Zodiacal series.

Pilesepe.
In the centre of this constellation there is

27*

31 8 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

one of the brightest nebulous clusters in the
starry sky, and sufficiently luminous to be
be seen betimes with the naked eye. It looks
like the nucleus of a great comet, and has
often been taken for one. It is made up of
a multitude of little stars, and is often desig-
nated in modern astronomy as the Bee-hive.
The ancients called it Prcesepe, which, in its
Arabic and Hebrew elements, means the
Multitude, Offspring, the Young, the Innumer-
able Seed — the very idea in the text. The
Latins understood by it the manger from
which the asses were fed, the stall, the sta-
ble, the fold, and hence a house of enter-
tainment, the place into which travellers gath-
ered for refreshment and rest. The same
idea is expressed by Moses in connection
with Issachar, to whom the Jews referred
this sign, where he speaks of Issachar as
being gathered into tents, called to the
mountain, offering the sacrifices of right-
eousness, and sucking the abundance of the
sea and all the hid treasures of its sands
(Deut. 33: 18, 19). In Jacob's blessing of
his sons we have corresponding allusions and
still further identifications with the particulars
in this sign. In many of the classic refer-
ences to the Zodiac the figures here are two

PR^ESEPE. 319

asses, particularly represented by the two
stars, the one north and the other south of
Praesepe. And so Jacob prophesies of the
coming Shiloh, that to Him shall the gather-
ing of the people be, and that, having washed
His garments in the blood of grapes, as when
He treads the winepress of the fierceness of
the wrath of Almighty God, and having ac-
complished the destruction of His enemies,
as when He rides forth on the white horse to
destroy all hostile powers, " He shall bind His
foal to the vine, and His ass's colt to the
choice vine." Issachar himself is likened to
the great and strong ass which reclines be-
tween the two folds or resting-places, seeing
that "the rest is good and the land pleasant,"
even that for which he was willing to bow his
shoulder to the burden, and to serve and pay
tribute to possess (Gen. 49: 10-15).

The Scriptures thus not only give us the
imagery found in this sign, but connect the
sien itself — which was assigned to Issachar —
with the final results of the achievements of
the promised Seed of the woman — with the
rest that remains for the people of God —
with the ultimate home-gathering of the mul-
titudinous seed of faith — with the peaceful
and secure entrance of the Church upon the

320 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

" inheritance, incorruptible and undefiled, and
that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for
those who are kept by the power of God
through faith unto salvation ready to be re-
vealed in the last time" (i Pet. i : 4.-6).

The Myths.

The myths concerning this sign are faint
and feeble, but what is given amply conforms
to what the Scriptures record in connection
with it. The two asses which the Greeks ac-
cepted as the figures of Cancer they ex-
plained to be the animals by which Jupiter
was assisted in his victory over the giants,
but in repose now by the side of the celestial
crib. They would thus admirably identify
with the white horses on which Christ and
His heavenly armies rode when they came
forth for the destruction of the beasts, kings,
and armies that made war with the Lamb.
They would seem, indeed, to stand for the
same, but now resting in immortal glory after
the victory.

Other myths associate this Crab with the
famous contest of Hercules with the dreadful
Lernaean monster, and affirm that this was
the animal from the sea which Juno's envy
of the hero caused to bite his foot, but which,

THE NAMES. 321

being quickly despatched, was rewarded by
being placed among the heavenly constella-
tions. Hercules was the symbol of the Seed
of the woman as the suffering and toiling
Deliverer, the great Overcomer and Slayer
of the powers of evil, who, for the sake of
His people, endured the sting and bruising
of His heel ; and yet, for all the pains they
caused Him, He brings them at last to the
enjoyment of eternal rest and glory, having
slain their enmity by His cross.

The Names.
The Egyptians called this sign Klaria, the
Folds, the Resting-places. We call it Cancer,
which in later vocabularies means the Crab,
but which, in its Noetic roots, explains what
we are to see in this Crab. Khan means the
traveller's resting-place, and ker or cer means
embraced, encircled, held as within encircling
arms. And so Can-cer means Rest secured —
the object of desire at length reached, com-
passed, possessed, and inalienably held. Hence
also the chief star in this sign is named Acu-
bens, the sheltering, the place of retirement,
the good rest. Hence also other names in
this sign {Mdalafih and Al Himarein) mean
assembled thousands, the kids or lambs ; whilst

322 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

the whole is called in Hebrew, Arabic, and
Syriac by a name which signifies holding,
possessing, retaining. It is the sign of the
saints' everlasting rest, in which the head of
the Serpent is beneath their feet, as under
the feet of this Crab.

And what we thus find in the sign itself is
further illustrated and fully corroborated in
its accompanying Decans.

Ursa Minor.
The first of these is what is now called
Ursa Minor, the Lesser Bear. But this was
not its original name ; nor is it a bear at all.
Those who figure it as a bear are obliged to
give it a long uplifted tail, such as no bear
ever had. And what is very astonishing, on
the supposition that we here have to do with
the form of a bear, is, that the most remark-
able star in this constellation, and the most
observed and rested on by man in all the
heavens, is located far out on this unnatural
tail. Where is the sense that would lead any
astronomer, ancient or modern, to locate the
Pole Star of the heavens in an imaginary tail
of a feeble little bear ? The very idea is ab-
surd, and such an absurdity that we may be
sure the great old primeval astronomers are

URSA MINOR. 323

in no wise chargeable with it. It is said that
the North American Indians connected the
North Star with a bear, and that hence the
figure here must have been primitively known
as " the Bear ;" but it is not proven that these
Indians belong to the primitive peoples, whilst
they at the same time criticise and ridicule
those who name it a bear, as not knowing
what a bear is, or they never would have
given it a long and lifted tail.

The way in which Ursa Minor and Ursa
Major may have come to be called Bears is
perhaps from the fact that the ancient name
of the principal star in the latter is Dubheh
or Ditbah, and as Dob is the word for bear,
the Greeks and others took the name of that
star as meaning the Bear, and so called these
two corresponding constellations the Bears.

But Dubheh or Dubah does not mean bear,
but a collection of domestic animals, a fold,
as the Hebrew word Dober. The evidence is
that, according to the original intent, we are
to see in these constellations not two long-
tailed bears, but two sheep/olds or flocks, the
collected and folded sheep of God's pasture.

The ancient Danes and Icelanders called
Ursa Minor the Chair or Chariot of Thor.
and the old Britons ascribed the same to

324 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Arthur, their great divine hero. This is
coming much nearer to the astronomical facts
of the case, as also to the original ideas con-
nected with this constellation. It has seven
principal stars, often called Septentriones — the
seven which turn. The Arabs and the rab-
bins called them Ogilah, going rounds as
wheels ; and hence also they are called Charles s
Wain, the Kings Wagon, or the thing which
goes round. These noted seven stars are in
themselves sufficient to suggest some con-
nection with "the seven churches" which
John saw as "seven stars" in Christ's right
hand. The whole number of stars in this
constellation is twenty-four, which suggests
connection again between it and the " four-
and-twenty elders " whom John beheld " round
about the throne, clothed in white raiment,
and having on their heads crowns of gold"
(Rev. 4), which denote the seniors of the
elect Church in heaven. The ancient names
in this constellation are Kochab, the Star, al-
lied perhaps with the promise in Rev. 2 : 28,
otherwise rendered by Rolleston waiting the
coming ; Al Pherkadain, the Calves, the Young,
Hebraically, the Redeemed ; Al Gedi, the Kid,
the Chosen of the flock ; and Al Kaid, the As-
sembled, the gathered together. These are

THE POLE-STAR. $2$

all applicable to the Church of the first-born,
and particularly describe it as it finally comes
to its inheritance.

Aratus says that Jupiter transferred both
these bears to the sky from Crete during his
concealment in the Idsean cave ; but bears
were never known in Crete, though it was
plentiful enough in flocks and herds. But
the story agrees with the scriptural account
in this, that Christ mysteriously transfers the
Church of the first-born to heaven whilst yet
unmanifested to the rest of the world.

The Greeks called Ursa Minor, if not both
the Bears, Areas, or Arktos, a name which
Harcourt derives from Arx, the stronghold of
the saved. The myth concerning Areas is, that
he was the son of Jupiter and the nymph Cal-
listo, that he built a city on the site of the
blasted house of him who was served up as
a dish to try Jupiter's divinity, and that he
was the progenitor, teacher, and ruler of the
Arcadians ; which readily interprets in good
measure of what is written of the Church of
the first-born, particularly in its offices in the
mysterious future.

The Pole-Star.
It is part of the promise of the text that

28

326 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

the seed of faith is to " possess the gate of
his enemies" — that is, to take the house or
possession of the foe — and thenceforward
to hold what the enemy previously held.
Now, at the time these constellations were
formed, and for a long time afterward, the
Pole-Star was the Dragon Star, Alpha Dra-
conis. Thus this central gate, or hinge, or
governing-point of the earth's motion, was
then in the enemy's possession. But that
Dragon Star is now far away from the Pole,
and cannot again get back to it for ages on
ages, whilst the Lesser and higher Sheepfold
has come into its place ; so that the main star
of Areas is now the Pole-Star. The seed of
faith thus gets the enemy's gate. And un-
derstanding Ursa Minor of the Church of
the first-born in heaven, instated in the gov-
ernment of the earth, we have in it a striking
picture of the old prophecy fulfilled, when
once Satan is cast down and the saints reiom
with their Lord in glory everlasting.

It is also an interesting fact that no traces
of these Greek Bears are to be found in the
Egyptian, the Persian, or the Indian plani-
spheres, but only what is thoroughly agree-
able to the idea that we are here to see the
assembly of God's flocks in their heavenly

URSA MAJOR. 327

glory, authority, and dominion, as over against
the Serpent and the whole serpent dominion.

Ursa Major.

And this is made the more evident in the
second Decan of Cancer — Ursa Major, the
Great Bear, anciently, the Great Sheepfold,
the resting-place of the flock. The Arabs
still call this constellation Al Naish or An-
naish, the ordered or assembled together, as
sheep in a fold.

Jn the centre of the miscalled tail of this
so-called Bear we find the name Mizar, which
means guarded or enclosed place. The chief
star of all is Dubheh, herd or fold ; the sec-
ond is Merach, the flock ; another, Cab'd al
Asad, multitude of the assembled. Here we
also have the names El Acola, the sheepfold ;
Al Kaiad, the assembled ; Alioth, the ewe or
mother ; El Kaphrah, the protected, the cov-
ered, the Redeemed ; Dub he h Lachar, the latter
herd or flock, as distinguished from a former
in Ursa Minor. The book of Job refers to
" Arcturus and his sons" — to Ash, or Aish,
and "her" progeny. The old Jewish com-
mentators say that Aish here means the
seven stars of the Great Bear. The word is
often collective, denoting a community, hence

328 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

the flock, the congregation. /\nd in the so-call-
ed tail of this Bear we find the name Benet
Naish, the daughters of Aish, part of the flock
going out after Bootes, the Shepherd.

The myths say that this Bear is the nymph
Callisto, the mother of Areas, the son of Jupi-
ter, and that she was metamorphosed into a
bear by Juno. In the word Callisto we find
the Shemitic root which we aeain meet as
Caul&, a sheep/old, an enclosure. And with
this idea in mind a glance at these " seven
stars" shows how well the presentations an-
swer to an enclosure, from which the great
flock goes forth from the fold at the corner
led by their great Shepherd and Guardian,
to whose coming all the ages have been look-
ing from the beginning.

In the Dendera Zodiac this constellation
has a great female figure with the head of a
swine, the enemy of the Serpent, the tearer
of the earth, and holding in her hand a ereat
ploughshare, emblematic of tearing up, bruis-
ing, turning under; and the name by which it
is called is Fent-Har, the Sej'pent- bruiser, the
Serpent-horri/ler. This ploughshare appears
in both these constellations, and may have
given rise to the association of the plough
with these stars ; but the whole significance

ARGO. 329

is that of the seed of faith in power and tri-
umph over the Serpent and its progeny.

All this sufficiently shows that we here have
to do with the happy sheepfold, the flock of
God, in heavenly glory and dominion, and not
in the least with the anomalous wild bears of
the Greeks and the later Western peoples.
The picture is that of the seed of faith spoken
of in the text in its twofoldness — the Church
of the first-born round about the throne, sig-
nified by the Polar centre, and the Church of
the after-born in still ampler numbers, led
and guarded by the great Bootes amid the
everlasting pastures.

Argo.
And to make this the clearer, the third
Decan of Cancer was framed. This is Argo>
the mysterious ship of the mysterious Argo-
nauts returned from their successful expedi-
tion to recover the Golden Fleece. Since
the time of Homer, and long before Homer
lived, the world has been full of noise about
this ship and these gods and demigods of
the Argonautic Expedition. But that same
world till now has been flounderine about to
find a key to unlock the mystery in which the
story is enveloped. Many are the sugges-

28*

330 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

tions to explain it, but all as empty of sat-
isfactoriness as they are beneath the import-
ance and significance always and everywhere
attached to it. The trouble is, that men have
ever persisted in trying to interpret it with
reference to the affairs of ordinary human
history or of some wild conceits of dream-
ing poets ; whereas it belongs to the mystic,
spiritual, and prophetic ideas frescoed on the
stars, and to nothing else under heaven.
Taken in these relations, and construed with
the rest of these signs as we found their true
application to be, we can have no difficulty.
That Golden Fleece was the lost treasure of
human innocence and righteousness, of which
the subtlety of the Serpent had bereft man-
kind in the Garden of Eden, and so held and
g-uarded it that no mere men could ever find
or recover it. In the grove of Mars, the
fierce god of justice, at Colchis, the citadel
of atonement, it lay, the Serpent watching it
with jealous and ever- wakeful eyes. Nor
was there a mortal to be found able to ap-
proach it until the true Jason, the Recoverer,
the Atoner, the Healer, even Jesus, came, or-
ganized His Argo, His company of travellei's,
made up of heroes under His command and
leadership, and went forth through various

THE NAMES. 33 T

trials, conflicts, and sufferings, helped by the
holy oracles that went along, and sustain-
ed by the heavenly ointments and powers to
heal the wounds and hurts that had to be
encountered, and took the precious prize, and
then through varied fortunes brings the he-
roes back victorious to his own home-shores.
And here, in the constellation of Argo, we
have the picture of that return — the. ship and
the brave travellers come home, with the lost
treasure regained, their toils and hazards and
battles over, and blessed rest their lasting in-
heritance. Here the story fits in every part.
It is the old ship of Zion landed in the heav-
enly port. Understand it so, and every fea-
ture takes on an evangelic light and a meaning
commensurate with its fame. Nor is it pos-
sible to contemplate the vivid correspondence
without wonderment at the prophetic know-
ledge and spiritual understanding and antici-
pations of those primeval sages who framed
these signs md gave out their meaning.

The Names.

And what we thus read in the story of the

Argonauts is confirmed by the names in the

constellation itself. The brightest star in the

group is Canopies or Canobns. And this is the

332 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

name of the great hero and helmsman, who
died from the serpent's bite, but whom the
Egyptians worshipped as a divine being.
The name itself means the possession of Him
who ccmeth, and thus explains why the Egyp-
tians represented Canobus by a great trea-
sure-jar. Other names are also here which
tell us what we are to understand. Sephina
means multitudinous good, the very abundance
of the seas and of treasures referred to by
Moses under the sien of Issachar. Tureis
means the firm possession in hand, the treasure
secured. Asmidiska means the travellers re-
leased. And Soheil means what was desired.

In the Dendera Zodiac we have here the
figure of a great ox enclosed, with the cross
suspended from his neck, the symbol of the
great possession marked with the ancient
token of immortality and eternal life. And
the name of this figure is Shes-en-Fent, re-
joicing over the Serpent. All this expresses
exactly what I have said is the great subject
of Cancer.

In the Persian Zodiac we have here three
young women walking at leisure, the same
with the daughters of Aish, signifying the
Church in its final inheritance.

Thus the whole presentation binds up and

A SWEET CONSOLATION. 333

links together from all sides to fix upon the
sien of Cancer and its Decans the intention
to make it the recorded symbol, prophecy,
and hope of the heavenly rest for the re-
deemed which shines so conspicuously in all
the scriptural promises. It is the star-pic-
ture of the multitudinous seed of faith at
length possessing the gate of the enemy,
rejoicing over him in life eternal, and going
forth in abundant peace and blessedness, with
the Serpent's head effectually trodden beneath
their feet.

A Sweet Consolation.
It is a blessed consolation to the oft-weary
toilers and travellers in this world to know
that there does remain a rest for the people
of God. With all the trials and hardships to
which they are subjected here, there is to
come a blessed recompense. Jesus says :
"Let not your heart be troubled; in my
Father's house are many mansions. I go to
prepare a place for you ; and if I go, and pre-
pare a place for you, I will come again, and
receive you unto myself, that where I am ye
may be also" (John 1 4 : 1-3). Isaiah sings:
"The ransomed of the Lord shall return, and
come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy

334 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

upon their heads : they shall obtain joy and
gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee
away" (25 : 10). John in prophetic vision
looked over into that other world, and writes:
" I beheld, and lo, a great multitude which no
man could number, of all nations, and kin-
dreds, and peoples, and tongues stood before
the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with
white robes, and palms in their hands. These
are they which came out of great tribulation,
and have washed their robes, and made them
white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore
are they before the throne of God, and serve
Him day and night in His temple : and He
that sitteth upon the throne shall dwell among
them. They shall hunger no more, neither
thirst any more ; neither shall the sun light
on them, nor any heat. For the Lamb which
is in the midst of the throne shall feed them,
and lead them unto living fountains of waters :
and God shall wipe away all tears from their
eyes" (Rev. 7:9-17); "And there shall be
no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying,
neither shall there be any more pain : for the
former things are passed away" (21 : 4). And
even from His throne in glory the Saviour
sends word to His struggling people: "To
him that overcometh will I grant to sit with

a SWEET CONSOLATION. 335

Me in my throne, even as I also overcame,
and am set down with my Father in His
throne" (Rev. 3:21). Such are the great
and precious promises given to us, and such
the possession to which we aspire, They are
promises also that shall surely be fulfilled.
God has pledged himself by His oath to
make them good. They are the same that
glowed in the hearts of the primeval patri-
archs, who saw them afar off, and were per-
suaded of them, and embraced them, and
confessed that they were pilgrims and strang-
ers on the earth. On these imperishable stars
they hung and pictured their confident belief
and anticipations, whereby they, being dead,
yet speak — speak across these many thou-
sands of years — speak for our comfort on
whom the ends of the world have come. Let
us, then, be encouraged to believe as they be-
lieved, to hope as they hoped, laboring and
looking for entrance into that same holy rest,
even the everlasting kingdom of our Lord
and Saviour Jesus Christ.

Hectute jfflurtemtl).

THE CONSUMMATED VICTORY.

Rev. 5:5: " Weep not : behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judafc,
the Root of David, hath prevailed to open the book, and to loose the
seven seals thereof."

THE scene of these words was in the
heavenly spaces, whither the Apostle
John had been caught up to witness what is
to come to pass after the present Church-
period comes to its close. They bring to
view a great and oppressive sorrow and a
great and glorious consolation.

In the hand of enthroned Almightiness lay
a roll or document written within and without
and sealed with seven seals. That roll de-
noted the title-deed of the inheritance which
man had forfeited by disobedience, and which
had reverted into the hand of God, to whom
the race had become hopelessly indebted.
Those "seven seals" attested the absolute-
ness of the bonds of forfeit, and bespoke
how completely the inheritance was disponed
away and gone. Nor could it ever be recov-

:«6

THE CONSUMMATED VICTORY. 337

ered to man, except as some one should be
found with worth, merit, and ability to satisfy
the claim, lift the document, and destroy its
seals. But neither in heaven or earth nor
under the earth did any one appear worthy
to take up the writing, or even so much as to
look upon it. This was the grief which made
the Apostle weep. It seemed to say to him
that man's patrimony was clean gone for
ever. It drew a dark and impenetrable veil
over all the promises and over all man's pros-
pects, as if everything hoped for was now
about to fail. Could it be that all the fond
anticipations touching " the redemption of
the purchased possession" were now to mis-
carry, and the whole matter, of which the
saints had been prophesying so long, go by
default ? So the matter looked, which was a
grief indeed that well might overwhelm the
soul of an Apostle, even in heaven.

But, though John " wept much," he was not
left to weep long. A voice from among
the throned elders soon broke in to relieve
his anxiety and dry his tears. That voice
said : " Weep not : behold, the Lion of the tribe
of Judah, the Root of David, hath prevailed to
open the book, and to loose the seven seals there-
of" This was the consolation which com-

29 W

338 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

forted the holy Seer, and which he was di-
rected to write for the cheer and comfort of
the sorrowing Church in all these ages since.
And what was thus said to John, both in sub-
stance and in figure, we likewise find written
/ upon the stars in the twelfth and last sign of
the Zodiac and its Decans.

The Lion.
The text speaks of a mystic Lion. The
lion is a kingly, majestic, noble, but terrible
creature, so strong and courageous as to fear
nothing, and so fierce and powerful that no
other animal can stand before him. The
names of the lion in Hebrew, Arabic, Syriac,
and Coptic, though different, all signify about
the same, and mean He that rends, that tears
asunder, that destroys, that lays waste. The
name in Greek and Latin is formed from
words which express sharp and naming sight,
leaping forth as flames, coming with raging
vehemence. From this we see how the ear-
lier peoples were impressed by what they
saw and knew of this terrible beast. The
common sentiment of mankind has associ-
ated it with royalty and dominion, and award-
ed it the title of " king of beasts." It scarcely
has an equal in physical strength, which is

THE LION. 339

further combined with extraordinary quick-
ness and agility. Ordained to feed on flesh,
it is fitted for the work of capture and de-
struction, and is supplied with the most pow-
erful physical machinery conceivable for the
purpose. It can easily kill and drag away a
buffalo, and it can crush the skull of a horse
or break the backbone of an ox with one
stroke of its paw. Its claws can cut four
inches in depth at a single grasp. It has
great ivory teeth capable of crunching a bul-
lock's bones. The fall of its fore paw in
striking is estimated to be equal to twenty-
five pounds in weight, whilst it is able to
handle itself with all the nimbleness of a cat,
to whose family the lion belongs. The pos-
session of such powers, with its instincts for
blood, renders this animal wonderfully daring,
bold, and self-confident, and the great terror
of men and beasts in the vicinity of its haunts.
When the lion is assailed and thoroughly
aroused, and lifts himself up in proud con-
templation of his foes, though banded in
troops around him, his composed, majestic,
and defiant mien is described as noble and
magnificent beyond conception ; whilst the
terribleness of his growl and the thunder of
his roar contribute to make the picture al-

340 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

most superhumanly impressive. And this is
the image which we are called to contemplate
in the text as describing the character and
majesty of Christ in connection with the fina)
scenes of the taking of the roll from the hand
of eternal Godhead, the breaking of its seals,
and the clearing of the earth from all enemies
and usurpers.

Christ as the Lion.
When the dying Jacob blessed his sons, he
pronounced Judah a lion, whom his brethren
should praise, whose hand should be in the
neck of his enemies, and before whom his
father's children would bow down (Gen. 49 :
8, 9). His words on that occasion were all
intensely prophetic. What he said of Judah
applied to the warlike and victorious energy
which was afterward shown in that tribe.
The same received remarkable fulfilment in
David, in whom the lion-nature was strikingly
exhibited, and whose boast in the Lord was,
" By Thee I can dash in pieces the warlike
people. I pursue after mine enemies, and 4
overtake them, and turn again until I have
consumed them" (Ps. 18). But these lion-
qualities assigned to Judah looked onward
to a still nobler King, who " sprang out of Ju-

CHRIST AS THE LION: 34 1

dah" as David's lineal descendant and heir,
who is at once David's Lord and David's son,
and pre-eminently the Lioji of whom Jacob
spoke.

Under the New Testament, and during the
course of the existing Church-period, our
Saviour is more commonly contemplated as
the innocent, uncomplaining, and spotless
Lamb of sacrifice, meekly yielding up His
life that we might live. Even among the
stupendous works of battle and judgment
set forth in the Apocalypse, He still appears
again and again as " the Lamb" — " a Lamb as
it had been slain," " the Lamb slain from the
foundation of the world" — by whose blood
the saints are washed from their sins, their
garments made white, and their final victory
over all Satan's accusations achieved. And
to His people, even as the eternal Bride-
groom, He will never cease to be the Lamb
of God, by whose sacrificial death and medi-
ation they have their standing and their bless-
edness. Neither does He cease to be the
Lamb even in connection with His being the
terrible Lion. The Lamb is capable of wrath,
and in the day of His wrath He is the Lion.
He is the one to His friends, and He is the
other to His enemies. Nay, He does not

29*

342 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

come to the exercise of His powers and pre-
rogatives as the Lion, except as he first clears
away all impediments and overcomes all em-
barrassments by means of sacrificial atone-
ment and satisfaction for the sins of those
for whom He at length takes the character
of the Lion, to tear His and their enemies in
pieces. This is what the elder means when
he says that this Lion of the tribe of Judah
" hath prevailed'' so as to be in position of
worthiness and ability, as the almighty Re-
deemer, to go forward as a Lion to take the
inheritance by destroying all who have ob-
truded themselves upon it and presume to
hold it in defiance of His royal rights.

The Lion-Work.
Nor are the Scriptures sparing in their ref-
erences to this lion-character and lion-work
of the orlorious Redeemer when thino-s have
once come to ripeness for the sharp sickle of
judgment. Not only Jacob and Moses, but
all the prophets, have alluded to it. Thus
the word of the Lord by Hosea (13:7,8)
was : " I will be unto them as a lion. I will
rend the caul of their heart. I will devour
them like a lion." Thus Zephaniah (3 : 8)
prophesied : " Wait ye upon me, saith the

THE LION- WORK. 343

Lord, until the day that I rise tip to the prey :
for my determination is to gather the nations,
that I may assemble the kingdoms, to pour
upon them my indignation, even all my fierce
ano-er : for all the earth shall be devoured
with the fire of my jealousy." Thus Isaiah
(42 113), referring to the period of the judg-
ment, says : • ■ The Lord shall go forth as a
mighty man, He shall stir up His jealousy
like a man of war: He shall cry, yea, roar;
He shall prevail against His enemies." Thus
Amos declares : " The Lord will roar from
Zion, and utter His voice from Jerusalem ;
and the habitations of the shepherds shall
mourn, and the top of Carmel shall wither.
Will a lion roar in the forest when he hath
no prey?" (1:2; 3:4, 8). "Consider this,"
saith the Lord (Ps. 50: 22), " ye that forget
God, lest I tear you in pieces, and there be
none to deliver."

And here, in the sign of Leo, is this very
Lion, thoroughly aroused, salient, and full
of majesty, the same in all the pictorial Zo-
diacs of all nations. It is the same " Lion of
the tribe of Judah " to which the text refers,
for in the Jewish astronomy this twelfth sign
was the sign of Judah. He is the Lion of
Judah in the text, and He is the Lion of Ju-

344 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

dah in the Zodiac. The record of the signs
and the record of the Word are here precisely
identical. The coincidence is positive and ab-
solute, and rests on no mere inferences from
mere likeness or concurring circumstances.
The picture in the sky is one and the same
with the picture in the Revelation as shown
to John in his visions in Patmos.

In the Apocalypse the Lion-Lamb takes
the roll from the hand of eternal Majesty
amid thrills of exultation which shake the
whole intelligent universe from centre to cir-
cumference. He tears asunder seal after seal,
until the very last is reached and broken, and
with each there bursts forth a divine almighti-
ness, seizing- and convulsing the whole world
as it never before was affected. The white
horse of conquering power, and the red
horse of war and bloodshed, and the black
horse of scarcity and famine, and the cadav-
erous horse of Death with Hades at his heels,
dash forth in invincible energy upon the apos-
tate populations of the earth. The heavens
are shaken, and seem to collapse like a fall-
ing tent, the earth is filled with quaking, the
mountains and islands are moved out of
their places, and the mightiest and bravest,
as well as the weakest, of men are filled with

THE LION- WORK. 345

horror and dismay. The great tribulation,
the like of which never was and never again
shall be, sets in. The golden censers of the
heavenly temple, filled with fire from the ce-
lestial altar, are emptied into the earth amid
cries and thunders and terrific perturbations.
The judgment-angels sound their trumpets
and pour out the contents of their bowls of
wrath, filling the world with burning and bit-
terness and tripled woe, unloosing hell itself
to overrun and deceive and torment the na-
tions, developing all their antichristianism
into one great and all-commanding embodi-
ment of consummated iniquity, and gather-
ing its abettors at the last into the great
winepress of the wrath of God, to be trodden
by the divine Avenger till the blood flows in
depth to the horses' bridles for more than a
hundred miles, and who will no more give
over until the beasts from the abyss, and the
Devil, and all theirs, are cast into the burning
lake of the second death.

Such is the Lion-work of the Root and Off-
spring of David as it was shown to the Apos-
tle John, and directed to be written for our
learning. And what is thus pictured in the
last book of the Scriptures is the same that
was fore-intimated and recorded in this last

34-6 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

sign of the Zodiac before any one book of
our present Bible was written.

The Sign of Leo.

Here is the great Lion in all the majesty
of His fierce wrath — Aryeh, He who rends ;
Al Sad, He who tears and lays waste ; Pi-
mentekeon, the Pourer-out of rage, the Tearer
asunder ; Leon, the vehemently coming, the
leaping forth as a consuming fire. The chief
star embraced in this figure, situated in the
Lion's breast, whence its mighty paws pro-
ceed, bears the name of Regel or Re^tdus,
which means the feet which crush, as where
it is said of the Messiah that He shall tread
upon the serpent and asp, and trample the
dragon under His feet (Ps. 91 : 13). The
second star in Leo is called Denebola, the
Judge, the Lord who cometh with haste. The
third star is Al Giebha, the exalted, the exalt-
ation. Other names in the sio-n are Zosma,
the shining forth, the epiphany ; Minchir al
Asad, the punishing or tearing of him who
lays waste ; Deneb al Eced, the Judge com-
ing, who seizes or violently takes ; and Al
Defera, the putting down of the enemy.

As nearly and fully as names can express
it, we thus have the same thines in the Zo-

HYDRA. 347

diacal Leo that we find ascribed to the Lion
of the tribe of Judah in the Apocalypse.
They both tell one and the same story — the
story of the wrath of the Lamb, and His
great and final judgment-administrations, in
which the kingdom of Daniel's mystic stone,
cut out of the mountain without hands, falls
upon, breaks in pieces, grinds to powder, and
scatters in undistinguishable dust all other
kingdoms and powers, and sweeps everything
inimical to a common and eternal perdition.

And what we find so vividly pictured and
expressed in the sign is still further and most
unmistakably corroborated in its accompany-
ing side-pieces or Decans.

Hydra.
The great mission of the promised Seed
of the woman was effectually to bruise the
Serpent's head. This is the all-comprehending
burden of the assurance given to fallen Adam,
and his children after him. The Serpent was
the subtle and snaky creature which deceived
and seduced our first parents into transgres-
sion. Whether in the form of a literal snake
is not worth our while to inquire ; but it was
some visible serpentine shape by which Eve
was approached, and in and behind which was

348 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

a treacherous, intelligent, evil spirit, who re-
appears again and again in the histories and
prophecies of the Scriptures, even up to the
end, as " the great Dragon, that old Serpent,
called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth
the whole world" (Rev. 12: 9). He was
once a good angel and a chief among the
angels, but " kept not his first estate," left his
place as one of God's loyal subjects, abused
his free will to sin and rebellion, and fell
under bonds of condemnation, in which he is
held over unto the judgment of the great day.
Meanwhile, he is exerting his great powers to
the utmost in malignity toward God and all
good. By his successful deception of our
first parents he got a footing in this world,
and has here planted and organized a vast
Satanic kingdom, over which he reigns, and
which he inspires and directs, impiously set-
ting himself up as another god over against
the true and only God, and particularly against
Christ as the rightful Heir and King of the
earth. Hence the saying of the Apostle
Paul, which is ever true of all God's people :
" We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but
against principalities, against powers, against
the rulers of the darkness of this world,
against wicked spirits in the air " (Eph. 6 : 12).

HYDRA. 349

During these six thousand years, which the
Apostle calls " man's day" as distinguished
from " the Lord's day " or the day of enforced
heavenly rule, this subtle and snaky spirit has
managed to worm himself into everything that
goes to make up human life, corrupting and
perverting it to his own base ends, seating
himself in all the centres of influence and
power, and making himself the very king and
god of this world. From all these places he
must be dislodged, his dominion broken, his
works destroyed, and he and all his effect-
ually rooted out and put down, before the
heavenly kingdom can come in its fulness or
the great redemption-work reach its intended
consummation. In other words, the whole
empire and influence of the Serpent must be
rent to atoms, worked clean out of the whole
realm of humanity, and so crushed as never
to be able to lift up its head again. Toward
this end all the dispensations and gifts of
God, from the first promise to Adam until
now, have been directed. Toward this end
all the works and administrations of Christ
to this present are framed. To this end He
is to come again in power and great glory as
the Lion of the tribe of Judah, to " put down
all rule and all authority and power," and
30 •

35° THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

to trample "all enemies beneath His feet."
And here, in the first Decan of Leo, is the
grand picture of that consummation. Here
is Hydra, that old Serpent, whose length
stretches one-third the way around the whole
sphere, completely expelled from the places
into which he had obtruded, fleeing now for
his life, and the great Lion, with claws and
jaws extended, bounding in terrific fury and
seizing the foul monster's neck.

Myths and Names.
According to the myths, this Hydra was
the terrible monster which infested the Ler-
naean lake — image of this corrupt world. It
was said to have a hundred heads, neither of
which could be killed simply by cutting off,
for unless the wound was burned with fire
two immediately grew out where there was
only one before. The poets describe him as

" Raising a hundred hissing heads in air ;
When one was lopped, up sprang a dreadful pair."

All this answers wonderfully well to the his-
tory of evil in the world, and the impossibil-
ity of effectually overcoming it in any one of
its manifestations except by the fires of judg-
ment.

MYTHS AND NAMES. 35 1

The myths further say that it was one of
the great labors imposed on Herakles to des-
troy this dreadful monster, in which he also
succeeded, helped by his faithful companion
and charioteer, Iolaus. But his success was
only by means of fire and burning, by ap-
plying a red-hot iron to the wound as head
after head was severed from the horrid form.
Herakles was the deliverer sent to free the
world of its great pests. He was the myth-
ologic symbol of the Seed of the woman who
was to come to make an end of all ill powers.
Mythology thus answers to Revelation, and
well bears out the interpretation of Hydra as
a picture of Satan finally vanquished, rent,
burned, destroyed by the fury of Judah's
Lion.

In the Dendera sphere the Lion stands di-
rectly on the Serpent, whilst underneath is
the hieroglyphic name Knem, which means
vanquished, conquered. The plain idea is
that here is the end of the Serpent-dominion.

The name Hydra means the Abhorred. The
principal star, Al Phard, means the Separated,
the Excluded, the Put out of the way. Another
name in the constellation is Minckir al Sug-ia,
which means the punishing, or tearing to pieces,
of the Deceiver.

35 2 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Everything thus falls in with the one idea,
and adds its share to prove that we here
have, by the intent of those who framed
these signs, a direct and graphic picture of
the glorious triumph of the Seed of the wo-
man crushing the Serpent's head and putting
him out of the way for ever.

And if further evidence is needed, it is fur-
nished in the two remaining Decans of this
final sign.

Crater, or the Cup of Wrath.
The Psalmist (75 : 8) says : " In the hand of
the Lord there is a cup, and the wine is red ;
it is full of mixture ; and He poureth out of
the same : but the dregs thereof all the wick-
ed of the earth shall wring out, and drink ;"
" Upon the wicked He shall rain burning
coals, fire and brimstone, and a fiery tempest :
this shall be the portion of their cup" (11:6).
Concerning every worshipper of the Beast
John heard the angel proclaim, " The same
shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God,
which is poured out without mixture into the
cup of His indigriation ; and he shall be tor-
mented with fire and brimstone in the pres-
ence of the holy angels, and in the presence
of the Lamb ; and the smoke of their torment

CRATER, OR THE CUP OF WRATH. 353

ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they
have no rest day nor night" (Rev. 14: 10,
11). The portion of the worshippers of the
son of perdition is " the lake of fire/' and the
same is likewise dealt out to the Beast and
the False Prophet, and ultimately to the
Devil himself: for John saw him " cast into
the lake of fire and brimstone, where the
Beast and the False Prophet are," and where
he " shall be tormented day and night for
ever and ever" (Rev. 20 : 10). In other
words, he and all his are to drink of the wine
of the wrath of God which is poured out with-
out adulteration or dilution into the cup of
the divine indignation.

And lo ! here, as the second Decan of
Leo, we have the very picture of that Cup,
broad, deep, full to the brim, and placed di-
rectly on the body of this writhing Serpent !
Nay, the same is sunk into his very sub-
stance, for the same stars which mark the
bottom of the Cup are part of the body of
the accursed monster, so that the curse is
fastened down on him and in him as an ele-
ment of all his after being ! Dreadful be-
yond all thought is the picture John gives of
this Cup of unmingled and eternal wrath, but
not a whit more dreadful than the picture of
30* x

354 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

it which the primeval prophets have thus in-
scribed upon the stars.

CORVUS, OR THE RAVEN.

But this is not all. The wise man says;
" The eye that mocketh at his father, and
despiseth to obey his mother, the ravens of
the valley shall pick it out, and the young
eagles shall eat it" (Prov. 30:17). When
David, the first great impersonation of Ju-
dah's Lion, met the terrible Goliath of Gath,
he cursed him in the name of the Lord God
of Israel, and said : " I will smite thee, and
take thy head from thee ; and I will give the
carcasses of the host of the Philistines this
day unto the fowls of the air and to the wild
beasts of the earth" (1 Sam. 17 146). So,
when the Lord of lords and King of kings
dashes forth on the white horse, with the
armies of heaven following Him on white
horses, to tread the winepress of the fierce-
ness and wrath of Almighty God, an angel
stands in the sun, calling with a great voice
to all the fowls and birds of prey to come and
feast themselves on the flesh of the enemy
(Rev. 19:17, 18). And here, in the third
Decan of Leo, we have the pictorial sign o{
the same thing. Here is Corvus, the Raven,

THE CAREER OF THE SERPENT. 355

the bird of punishment and final destruction,
grasping the body of Hydra with its feet and
tearing- him with its beak.

The myths have but little sensible or con-
sistent to say of this Raven, except in mak-
ing it the symbol of punished treachery.
The Greeks and Romans had for the most
part lost its meaning. The Egyptians called
it Her-na, the Enemy broken. The star in
the eye of this ill-omened bird is called At
Chiba, the Curse inflicted. Another name in
the constellation is Minchir al Gorab, the Ra-
ven tearing to pieces. It is the sign of the
absolute discomfiture and destruction of the
Serpent and all his power ; for when the
birds once begin to tear and gorge the flesh
of fallen foes, no further power to resist, harm
or annoy remains in them. Their course is run

Thus, then, and thus completely, does Ju-
dah's Lion dispose of that old Serpent-enemy,
with all his Hydra heads, when once the day
of final settlement comes.

The Career of the Serpent.

Great and marvellous is the part which this

arch-enemy has played in the history of our

race, is still playing, and will yet play before

the end is reached. Like a dark and chilling

35<3 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

shadow he came up upon the new-born world,
insinuated his slime into the garden of human
innocence, deceived and disinherited the race
at its very spring, and so spun his webs around
the souls of the earlier generations as to drag
almost the entire population of the earth to
one common ruin. Hardly had that great
calamity passed when he began again with
new schemes to get men in his power and
sway them to his will. Before the Flood he
won them through their carnal passions. Now
he set himself to taint their holy worship, per-
verting it into idolatries which have held and
debased the great body of mankind for these
forty centuries, and still holds great portions
or the world in darkness and in death. Then
he plied them with visions of empire and do-
minion, and thus filled the earth and the ages
with murderous tyrannies, misrule, oppres-
sions, wars, and political abominations. Then
he began to corrupt the thinking and philos-
ophies of men, thereby making them willing
slaves to damning error. And even to-day
he is the very god of this world, to whose lies
the vast majority of the race render homage,
whose rule is in living sway over at least two-
thirds of the population of the earth, which
is full of misery from his power.

THE END. 357

Nor is there the slightest solid around for
hope that it will be essentially otherwise till
the great Lion of the tribe of Judah comes
forth in the fury of his almightiness to make,
an utter end of him and his infernal domina-
tion. But his doom is sealed. On the face
of these lovely stars it has been written from
the beginning, the same as in the Book.
Though Satan's grasp upon our world should
hold through the lone; succession of two-thirds
of the signs, there is at last a Lion in the way,
alive, awake, and mighty, even that Seed of
the woman whom he has all these aees been
wounding in the heel and trying to defeat and
destroy. That Lion he cannot pass. Cun-
ningly as the subtle Deceiver has wound him-
self about everything, injecting his poison and
making firm his hellish dominion, he will soon
be dragged forth to judgment, seized by al-
mighty power, crushed, torn, pierced, put
under the bowl of eternal wrath, whilst the
hundred-headed body in which he has oper-
ated through all these aees is eiven to the
black birds of unclean ness to be devoured.

The End.
And when the Serpent thus falls the circle
of time is complete, and it is eternity. There

358 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

is no continuity of the way of time beyond
the victorious triumphs of Judah's Lion.
Death, and Hell, and all the wild beasts, with
all their children, and the old Serpent, their
father, with them, thenceforward have their
place in the everlasting prison burning with
fire and brimstone, which is the second death.
And outside of that dread place " there shall
be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying,
neither shall there be any more pain : for the
former things are passed away." Then the
great voices in heaven sing: "Behold, the
tabernacle of God is with men, and He will
dwell with them, and they shall be His peo-
ple, and God himself shall be with them, and
be their God ;" for they " shall inherit all
things " (Rev. 21).

Blessed consummation ! How should we
look and long and pray for it, as Jesus has
directed where He tells us to say, " Thy king-
dom come — Thy will be done on earth as it is in
heaven " ! Well might one of England's great-
est poets cry : " Come forth out of Thy royal
chambers, O Prince of all the kings of the
earth ! Put on the visible robes of Thy impe-
rial Majesty ! Take up the unlimited sceptre
which Thy almighty Father hath bequeathed
Thee ! For now the voice of Thy bride calls

THE END. 359

Thee, and all creatures sigh to be renewed."
How cheering the hope, amidst the clash of
conflicting beliefs, the strife of words, the din
of war, the shouts of false joy, the yells of
idolatry, the sneers of unbelief, the agonies
of a dying race, and the groans of a whole
creation travailing in pain together in conse-
quence of the Serpent's malignity, that a pe-
riod is coming when eternal death shall be
that Serpent's portion ; when peace and order
and heavenliness shall stretch their brio-ht

o

wings over the happy sons of men ; when
rivers of joy proceeding from the throne of
God and of the Lamb shall water all this
vale of tears ; when cherubim to cherubim
shall cry, " Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God
of hosts ; the whole earth is full of His
glory ;" when myriads of myriads and thou-
sands of thousands of angels round about
the throne shall join in the acclaim of " Wor-
thy is the Lamb which hath been slain, to re-
ceive the Power, and Riches, and Wisdom,
and Might, and Honor, and Glory, and Bless-
ing ;" and when every creature which is in
heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth,
and upon the sea, and all things in them, shall
sing, "To Him that sitteth upon the throne,
and to the Lamb, be the Blessing, and the

360 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Honor, and the Glory, and the Dominion, for
the ages of the ages " ! Yet such is our hope
given us as an anchor for our souls, both sure
and steadfast, entering into that within the
veil, and linking us even now to those solid
shores of the world to come. We have it in
the written word of Prophets and Apostles,
and the same is certified to us by these ever-
lasting stars in their ceaseless journeyings
around the pathway of the circling year. God
be thanked for such a hope ! God be thanked
for the full and wide-sounding testimony to
its certainty ! God be thanked that it has
come to us, and that ours is the privilege of
taking it to our souls in the confidence and
comfort that it shall be fulfilled !

" Not the light that leaves us darker,

Not the gleams that come and go,
Not *he mirth whose end is madness,

Not the joy whose fruit is woe;
Not the notes that die at sunset,

Not the fashion of a day ;
But the everlasting beauty
And the endless melody,
Heir of glory !
That shall be for thee and me."

Hccture jftftenttf),

THE SECRETS OF WISDOM.

Job 1 1 : 6 : " He would show thee the secrets of wisdom, that they
are double to that which is."

THINGS are more than they seem. They
are not only more in themselves than
we can know or understand, but they are re-
lated to other and hidden spheres beyond
the reach of our natural reason. " They are
double" in their expression, so that what is
external and natural at the same time includes
something recondite and spiritual. The Scrip-
tures everywhere recognize this, and con-
stantly proceed upon it in what we call sym-
bols, types, parables, allegories, and tropes.
And the true " secrets of wisdom," as well as
the characteristics of divine teaching, accord-
ing to Zophar, lie in this double of what we
naturally observe and experience.

In so far, then, as this doubleness of show-
ing is a mark of divine teaching, the pri-
meval astronomy is pre-eminently a part of
God's own revelation ; for here we find not

31

361

362 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

only a superhuman knowledge of the natural
economy of the starry heavens, but a double-
ness of expression by which we may also
read the whole system of Messianic truths,
predictions, and hopes.

To human observation there is nothing
grander than this universe of heavenly worlds.
The study of them is justly regarded as the
sublimest of the sciences. But, on the basis
of these natural facts and presentations, there
is a duplicate of meaning touching another
department of the divine manifestations which
is vastly sublimer and more precious than all
the knowledge of astronomy.

The Ground thus Far.
In our endeavors to trace this double of
the starry expressions we have been occu-
pied entirely with the Solar Zodiac and its
thirty-six Decans. In this we have indeed
the main stellar presentations. Following
this Way through its various steps or sta-
tions, with their explanatory Faces, we ne-
cessarily have before us all the most con-
spicuous markings of the heavens. And if
there really is a legible record of the Gospel
in the stars, it must be found, above all, in
what we have thus eone over. Whether the

THE GROUND THUS FAR. 363

findings have in fact been such as to warrant
us in concluding that Christ and His fore-
announced achievements are there symbol-
ized, must be decided by those who will can-
didly consider what has been brought out.
For my own part, I have not the slightest
doubt or question on the subject. Taking
the facts, figures, and names as our common,
every-day astronomy gives them, I find such
clear and evident marks of connection and
design, such thorough consistency in the elab-
oration of all the details, such distinct and
orderly progress of thought in the arrange-
ments of beginning, continuity, and end, such
a universal and multitudinous array of myths
and legends founded on the constellations and
running parallel with their meaning as thus
interpreted, such a complete identity of im-
ages and terms with the scriptural presenta-
tions of the same things, and such a self-
evidencing and exhaustive outlining of all
the great features of the Gospel story, along
with such a profound and accurate penetration
into the whole organization of the visible uni-
verse,— that I should have to go against all
laws of evidence and principles of logic not
to accept it as very truth that these heavens
do declare "the glory of God" as embodied

364 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

in the person, mission, work, and redemptive
achievements of His Son Jesus Christ.

The Lunar Zodiac.

But the markings of the heavens are not
exhausted by what pertains to the Solar Zo-
diac and its Decans. There is also a Lunar
Zodiac. It consists of the same belt as the
Solar Zodiac, but divides that belt into twenty-
eight in place of twelve parts or steps ; and
these twenty-eight are called the Mansions
of the Moon. To each of these twenty-eight
steps a particular name is given. In the In-
dian astronomy each of these steps or Man-
sions also had a particular figure additional
to the name ; but the figures are not invari-
ably the same. In China and Arabia the
names are more uniform, but are given with-
out figures or emblems. The Parsis also had
the Lunar Zodiac, and made much of it.

Astronomers a^ree in reeardine this Lunar
Zodiac as containing the most ancient remains
of the science of the stars. The Romans,
Greeks, and Egyptians knew little or noth-
ing about it, but it is a matter of record in
China that it was known and understood in
that country as early as the reign of Yao,
about twenty- three hundred years before the

THE LUNAR ZODIAC. 365

Christian era, which was before the time of
Abraham.* In the Chinese astronomy it be-
gins with Virgo, which would seem to indi-
cate that the Chinese table came from the
antediluvian times.

The Lunar Zodiac is manifestly from the
same source as the Solar, and great import-
ance was attached to it wherever the know-
ledge of it was preserved in living observance.
In Arabia and in India from time immemorial
these Mansions of the Moon held place and
rank equal, if not superior, to the Solar Zo-
diac, and are found interwoven with all poetry
and science, and incorporated not only into
the worship and mythology, but also into va-
rious customs of private life. Children there
are still frequently named according to the
Lunar Mansions under which they were born.

They are preserved in Scandinavia and
Burmah, and traces of them have been found
in the ruins of ancient Mexico. Al Fercrani
in Bagdad, Albumazer in Spain, and Ulugh
Beigh, the Tartar prince and astronomer,
grandson of Tamerlane, have transmitted to

* This point is scientifically presented in Max Miiller's Sacred
Books of the East, vol. iii., by James Legge, where it is said that
" the most common, and what was the earliest, division of the Eclip-
tic in China is that of the twenty-eight Lunar Mansions, forming
what we may call the Chinese Zodiac."
31*

3^6 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

us the names and enumerations of these
Mansions of the Moon, and preserved to the
world the evidences of their corresponding
antiquity with the twelve signs of the Solar
Zodiac*

There is, therefore, every reason to expect,
if it was meant that the stars should carry a
prophetic record of the Gospel, that we would
find it also in the arrangement and naming
of these Lunar Mansions. And, as we would
anticipate, so it really is.

Names of the Lunar Mansions.

Christ was predicted as " the Desire of
nations," "the Desire of women;" and so
the first of these Mansions is named Al
Azua, the Desired. Christ was foretold as
uthe Branch," God's "servant the Branch,"
" the Branch of Righteousness who shall exe-
cute judgment," and the like ; and the second
of these Mansions is called Simak al Azel,
Branch of the power of God. It was pre
dieted of Christ that His soul should be made
an offering for sin (Isa. 53 : 10) : "He is the
propitiation for our sins and for the sins of

* See Hyde's Syntagma, vol. i. ; Freytag's Arabic Lexicon; and
Le Gem.il, Voy. dans les Indes.

THE LUNAR MANSIONS. 367

the whole world." And so the third of these
Mansions bears the name of Caphir, the
Atonement, the Propitiation by sacrifice.

These three Mansions correspond to Virgo.

Christ was everywhere promised as the Re-
deemer, the Saviour, He who should bring re-
demption ; and the fourth of these Mansions
is named Al Zubena, the redeeming, the re-
gaining by purchase, the bttying back. When
Christ died he said, " It is finished ;" and the
fifth of these Mansions is named Al Iclil, the
complete submission.

These two names answer to Libra.

And so the list proceeds in strict accord
with the scriptural prophecies and descrip-
tions of the Seed of the woman. Thus :

Corresponding to Scorpio.
Al Kalb, the cleaving or wounding; Al
Shaula, the sting, the deadly wound.

Corresponding to Sagittarius.

Al Nairn, the gracious, the delighted in ; Al
Beldah, hastily coming, as to judgment.

So far, the reference plainly is to the person
and work of Christ as respects himself, as in
the first quaternary of the Solar Zodiac.

The succeeding series runs thus :

368 the gospel in the stars.

Corresponding to Capricornus.
Al Dibah, the sacrifice slain.

Corresponding to Aquarius.
Sciad al Bida, witness of the rising*- or

o

drinking in ; Sciad al Su'itd, witness of the.
swimming- or outpouring ; Al Achbiya, the
fountain of pouring.

Corresponding to Pisces.

Al Pherg al Muchaddem, the progeny of
the ancient times ; Al Pherg al Muackker, the
progeny of the latter times ; Al Risha, the
band, the joined together.

Corresponding to Aries.

Al Sheratan, the wounded, that was cut off;
Al Botein, the treading under foot; Al Thur-
aiya, the enemy punished.

These names thus run in remarkable paral-
lel of meaning with the signs and more ample
showings in the second quaternary of the
Solar Zodiac. It is the same also with regard
to the rest of these names as compared with
the last four signs.

the milky way. 369

Corresponding to Taurus.
Al Debaran, the Leader, the Governor, the
Subduer ; Al Heka, the driving away.

Corresponding to Gemini.
Al Henah, the wounded in the foot ; Al Di-
rah, the ill-treated.

Corresponding to Cancer.
Al Nethra, the treasure, the possession ; Al
Terpha, the healed, the delivered, the saved.

Corresponding to Leo.

Al Gieba, the exaltation, the Prince ; Al
Zubra, the heaped-up, as sin and delayed
punishment ; Al Serpha, the burning, the fu-
neral-pyre.

The whole series of these names thus runs
parallel with the signs of the Solar Zodiac,
and ends up precisely in the same way, prov-
ing that they are of a piece with it.

The Milky Way.

Another distinct marking of the heavens

is a snowy belt, from four to twenty degrees

or more in width, which stretches obliquely

over the sky from south-west to north-east,

Y

370 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

thus cutting the Ecliptic, and extending en-
tirely around the whole circuit of the heavens
in another direction. It is best seen in the
months from June to November, and looks
like a great river of hazy brightness. It is
called the Galaxy, the Milky Way, the Galac-
tic Circle. It was once supposed to be a vast
collection of nebulous matter consisting of yet
forming- or unformed stars, but later inves-
tigations have demonstrated that the whole
Milky Way is made up of myriads on myriads
of suns like ours, which is itself one of them.
Milton refers to this great belt as

" A broad and ample road, whose dust is gold,
And pavement stars, as stars to thee appear —
A circling zone, powdered with stars."

The ancient heathen poets and philosophers
spoke of this Way as the path which their
deities used in the heavens, and claimed that
it led directly to the throne and " the Thun-
derer's abode." And if the primeval prophets
had wished to mark on the sky the steps and
stages in the life and work of the promised
Seed of the woman, and the results of the
same, this marvellous "pathway of the gods"
was well suited to their purpose. And so we
also find it employed.

Twelve of the constellations are situated

THE MILKY WAY. 37 1

in or on this Milky Way ; six of which relate
to the first advent, and six to the second.
They start at the lowest point with the Cross
and the Altar of sacrifice, the burning pen-
alty of sin ; as Christ humbled himself and
became obedient unto death, even the death
of the cross, and laid the foundations of sal-
vation in becoming a curse for us. Then
comes the cleft of Scorpio, the sting of death
and the power of hell, seeming to split
asunder the Milky Way itself. Then comes
the Eagle pierced ; then the Swan on out-
spread wings, going and returning with the
bright cross displayed upon its breast for all
the world to see ; and then the royal Cepheus
swaying the sceptre of empire, with his foot
upon the pole of dominion, high over all au-
thority and power ; all of which epitomizes
with great exactness the biblical portraiture
of Christ's history up to the time when He

is to come again.

The first thine to occur when the time of
Christ's second coming arrives is the seizing
away of His true people, dead' and alive, to
himself in the sky ; and so the next sign on
this Way is that of Cassiopeia, the enthroned
woman, the Church set free from its bonds
and crowned with heavenly glory.

372 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

The next picture is that of Pcrscvs, the
illustrious Breaker, full-armed and winged,
the savior of Andromeda, whom he has en-
gaged to make his bride, and the slayer of
the Gorgon, whose head, writhing with matted
snakes, he bears away in triumph.

The next is Auriga, the mighty Shepherd,
ruling the nations with a rod of iron, but
having the glorified Church in His bosom,
and holding the alarmed little kids all safe
on His mighty hand.

The next succeeding picture is that of
Gemini, the heavenly union of Christ and
His Church, the marriage of the Lamb.

The fifth picture is that of the doubly-glo-
rious Orion, the mighty Hunter of all the
wild beasts of apostate power in all their
lurking-places, going forth in His princely
and all-conquering energy, treading down the
Serpent beneath His feet, and slaying even
Death and Hell.

And then comes the last of the series,
Argo, the anchored ship of the heroes re-
turned from their perilous expedition to re-
cover the Golden Fleece, securely landed now
on the home-shores, with their imperishable
treasure secured for ever. This completes
the circle of the Snowy Way, which even the

THE PRIMEVAL PATRIARCHS. 373

heathen recognized and celebrated as the
path to glory and to God.

Could this arrangement, so clear, so con-
sistent, and so thoroughly conformed to all
that the Scriptures teach us on the subject
of our salvation, have come about by mere
accident ? Fitted in as it is with the Zodiacal
showings, on a circle so different, and yet,
in its own path, exhibiting the same story so
vividly and so fully, how can we otherwise
conclude but that here is proof of a purpose,
and of the operation of some great master
mind at once familiar with the whole Gospel
scheme and with the whole system of the
starry economies ?

But if we take the conclusion which thus
presses upon our acceptance, then we might
also reasonably expect to find other recogni-
tions of it, and to be able to trace the same
in the ancient symbolisms of the earthly econ-
omies also. And here too we only need to
look to find many remarkable facts.

The Primeval Patriarchs.
Take, for example, the names of the ante-
diluvian patriarchs as given in the fifth chapter
of Genesis. From early Christian antiquity
these have been held to contain a synopsis

32

374 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

of the whole Gospel story. These names all
have meanings ; and those meanings, taken
in their historic order, indicate the main things
in the history of our redemption. But who
would anticipate, without being told it, that
these names and their meanings equally cor-
respond with the Zodiac in the senses in which
I have been explaining them ?

Adam means the bright, the excellent, the
godlike, and also to suffer death. And who
is the fountain and soul of our salvation but
another Adam, the brightness of the Father's
glory and the express image of His person,
given to die for our sins ? But this is the
picture of the Seed of the woman in Virgo,
glorious as Spica, blessed as the Branch,
precious as the Desired One, like God as
Son of God, and the sufferer as Centaur and
the Victim !

Seth means appointed in the place of an-
other, a substitute, a compensation, a price.
So Christ is our Se.th, appointed to take our
place as our substitute, making compensation
for our sins, and paying the price by which
we are redeemed. But this is the precise rep-
resentation given in the sign of Libra !

Enos means mortal, suffering, afflicted. So
Christ was the appointed bearer of our griefs,

THE PRIMEVAL PATRIARCHS. 375

the carrier of our sorrows, stricken, smitten
of God, and afflicted, by whose stripes heal-
ing comes to us. But this again is the exact
showing we had in the sign of Scorpio !

Cainan means acquisition, forcible gaining
of possession. So Christ's mission is to
bruise the Serpent's head, to ride forth here-
after in joyous majesty as a warrior, whose
right hand shows terrible things, and whose
arrows are sharp in the heart of the King's
enemies. But this is the precise exhibit in
the sign of Sagittarius !

Mahalalecl means the display or praise of
God. And so it is everywhere set forth as
the particular outshining of God's glory and
the special topic of His praise that Christ
was "delivered for our offences and raised
again for our justification," thus begetting unto
himself a peculiar people to " make known the
riches of His glory," " to the intent that unto
the principalities and powers in the heaven-
lies might be known by the Church the mani-
fold wisdom of God," " to the praise of His
glory." But this again is what we had in the
sign of Capricornus !

yared means the descending, the coming
down, as the Holy Ghost shed forth to quick-
en and energize humanity, according to the

376 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

promise. But this was the showing which we
had in Aquarius !

Enoch means consecrated, initiated, taught,
trained, and this is what characterizes the
Church of all ages. To that of old time and
to that of our dispensation it could equally be
said : " Ye are a chosen generation, a royal
priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people,
that ye should show forth the praises of Him
who hath called you out of darkness into His
marvellous light" (i Pet. 2: 9). But this is
the very subject of the sign of Pisces !

Methuselah means released from death. So
Christ appeared to John in the visions of the
Apocalypse as the Lamb standing in the midst
of the throne, marked as having been slain,
but invested with the perfection of power, wis-
dom, and divine endowment, and having also
the keys of Death and of Hades to release
and bring forth all His people to the same
heavenly life. But this, again, is the very
presentation made in the sign of Aries !

Lantech means the strong, the mighty, the
wild and invincible overthrower. And so
Christ is to come "travelling in the greatness
of His strength," "with power and great
glory," to execute judgment upon the Enemy,
to make the apostate nations drink the cup of

THE PRIMEVAL PATRIARCHS. S77

His indignation, and to tread the winepress
of the wrath of Almighty God, till the moun-
tains are melted with blood. But this is the
exact presentation which we had in the sign
of Taztrus !

Noah means rest And so there remaineth
a rest for the people of God after the wicked
are destroyed — a calm repose with our Re-
deemer when we reach the farther shore of
the boisterous sea of this world — an everlast-
ing union with the Lord as His bride and wife.
But this is the very theme of the sign of Gem-
ini !

This exhausts ten signs of the Zodiac in
their order ; and if we would have names sim-
ilarly answering to the remaining two, Shem
and Arphaxad, in whom the line of the prom-
ised Messiah was continued after Noah, may
serve to furnish them.

SJiem means name, renown, the standard of
empire, the symbol of an established kingdom ;
just as is predicted of the glorious kingdom
to be given to the saints. But this is the sub-
ject given in the sign of Cancer ! And Ar-
phaxad means the strength, the stronghold
of the assembly ; which again is the import
of the sign of Leo !

It is marvellous that things should be so ;

32 *

3/8 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

but here are the facts, and they could by no
possibility have been what they are by mere
accident. There must needs have been great
intelligence thus to fit what we might call ac-
cidents of earth with such elaborations of signs
in the heavens, to utter and record in both the
full-length evangelic story. Nor could that in-
telligence have achieved such a work unhelped
by the Spirit of Him who alone knows the end
of all things from the beginning.

The Twelve Tribes of Israel.

Likewise in the names of Jacob's sons in
his prophetic blessings on them (Gen. 49),
in the corresponding song of Moses on the
several tribes of Israel (Deut. n), on the
banners borne by these tribes in their march
through the wilderness from Egypt to Ca-
naan, and in the jewels of the breastplate of
their officiating high priest, do we again find
distinct correspondence to the celestial signs,
just as I have been identifying and describing
them. I may not enter now upon the full
showing in these instances. I state only a
few elements of the presentation.

Zebulon means dwelling, the choosing and
entering upon a home. Jacob blessed Zebu-
lon as to dwell at the seas as a haven for the

THE TWELVE TRIBES OF ISRAEL. S79

ships. Moses sung of his joyful going forth.
His jewel representative was Bareketh, glit-
tering, bright. So Christ is the brightness of
the Father's glory, who, when He entered
upon His ministry of light and salvation, se-
lected Zebulon as its home-centre, and on
those shores opened out His brightness, so
that the land of Zebulon beheld a great light
come to dwell there as Lord and Saviour.
But all this is in thorough correspondence
with what hung prophetic in the sky in the
sien of Virgo.

The next succeeding sign did not appear
on any of the standards of Israel, for Levi
had no separate banner. The sanctuary it-
self was Levi's ensign. His business was to
take care of that, and there to offer sacrifices
for the people's sins. But all the more ex-
pressively did he thus bear aloft the showing
of redemption's price, just as we found it sig-
nalized in Libra. He kept the balances of
the sanctuary.

Dan means judge, administering as a judge.
Jacob describes him as judging and punishing,
and as a serpent and adder by the way that
biteth the horses' heels. Moses refers to him
as a lion's whelp, leaping from Bashan. His
emblem was the serpent, and the whole de-

3 SO THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

scription concerning him answers to Scorpio,
which was the place assigned him in the Jew-
ish Zodiac.

In the same way Asher answers to Sagitta-
rius. His jewel representative is called Sho-
ham, the lively, the strong, and his name
means the blessed, the happy, the triumphant
going forth. Moses speaks of him as ap-
proved and prospered, dipping his foot in oil,
wearing shoes of iron and brass, and riding
forth in the strength of the God of Jeshurun,
precisely as the picture is in Sagittarius.

Naphtali is " a hind," a wrestler with death,
let go to drop and die, but filled with favor
and blessing nevertheless ; falling, yet joy-
fully bringing forth abundant new life and
gladness by his " goodly words ;" which is
the showing in Capricornus.

Reuben in like manner corresponds to Aqua-
rius. His name means Behold a son, new be-
ing. Jacob speaks of him as the beginning
of strength and excellence, going on to excel
as water flows. His jewel was Nophek, the
pouring forth, as water and light.

Simeon means hearing and obeying. Jacob
associates Levi with him, signifying the united,
joined together, bound ; and Moses assigns
them the blessing of the prophetic lights and

THE TWELVE TRIBES OF ISRAEL. 38 1

perfections ; all of which answers to the
Church as pictured in the sign of Pisces.

So Gad is Aries. The name means the
seer, as the Lamb has "seven eyes." He is
pierced, but overcomes at the last. He is
blessed, seated as a lawgiver, dwelling as a
lion. His jewel was the diamond, cutting and
breaking, as well as shining. With the heads
of the people he executes the justice and
judgments of the Lord with Israel — that is,
with the Church. All of which is precisely
the showing in the sign of Aries.

Joseph is Taurus, the reem. Ephraim and
Manasseh are his two great horns, pushing
the people to the ends of the earth. The
arms of his hands are made strong by the
mighty God of Jacob. His glory is like the
firstlings of the herd. His jewel-sign signi-
fies tongues of fire. The two pictures are
exactly identical.

Benjamin is Gemini. He had two names,
as Gemini has two figures — Benjamin, son of
the right hand, and Benoni, son of my sorrow,
which together describe Christ and the Church
He has " begotten by His sorrows." Both
are the beloved of the Lord, the latter dwell-
ing between the shoulders of the other, shel-
tered and blessed by Jehovah all the daylong,

382 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

in the morning devouring the prey like a
ravening wolf, and in the evening dividing
the spoils.

Issachar means recompense. His jewel rep-
resentative is Pitdah, reward. Jacob speaks
of him as a strong ass resting between the
burdens of treasure. He sees his resting-
place that it is good. Moses describes him
as rejoicing in his tents, to whose mountains
the people come with sacrifices of righteous-
ness, and to suck the abundance of the seas
and the yet hidden treasures on the shore.
All these presentations answer throughout
to Cancer.

And in all the given particulars Judah is
Leo. His name means the praise and glory
and majesty of God. His banner bore the
sign of the rampant lion. His jewel repre-
sentative was the ruby, the symbol of blood-
shedding unto victory. And Jacob describes
him a^ the lion, the tearer in pieces, the glo-
rious victor, the same as exhibited in the sign
of Leo.

The New Jerusalem.
And when we come to the New Testament
we not only find the images of the constella-
tions repeatedly employed in the same sense

THE NEW JERLSALEM. 383

and application as in our interpretations of
the signs, but also systematically placed to-
gether, if not in the twelve Apostles of the
Lamb, yet in the twelve jewels which make
up the foundations of the New Jerusalem,
in which are the names of those Apostles.
I am not sufficient master of the lore re-
specting precious stones to verify all the
particulars involved, but, availing myself of
several lists which claim to give the facts, I
find the reading here just as distinct and
marvellous as anywhere else.

The Apostle says, "The first foundation
was jasper" which he describes as " a stone
most precious," bright and clear. This re-
minds us at once of Spica, the bright and
precious Seed of the woman. The meaning
of jasper is said to be coming to bruise and
be bruised — the same story of the coming of
the precious Seed of the woman as set forth
in Virgo.

"The second, sapphire" which means num-
ber, the count of price and weight ; which is
Libra.

"The third, chalcedony" which means afflic-
tion, torture; and this is the showing in
Scorpio.

"The fourth, emerald" which means defend-

384 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ing, keeping as a mighty protector ; and this
is the picture in Sagittarius.

" The fifth, sardonyx" which means the
Prince smitten; the same as in Capricornus.

" The sixth, sardius" which means the power
issuing forth ; and so is the parallel of Aqua-
rius.

" The seventh, chrysolite" which means He
who binds, who holds with bands, the bound to-
gether ; and this answers to Pisces.

"The eighth, beryl" which means the Son,
the first-born, the exalted Head ; correspond-
ing precisely with the sign of Aries.

"The ninth, topaz" the distinguished gem
of Ethiopia, which signifies dashing- in pieces ;
as we saw in Taurus.

"The tenth, chrysoprasus" nearly the same
as chrysolite, meaning they who are united ;
which is Gemini.

"The eleventh, jacinth" which means pos-
sessing, He shall possess ; just as we saw in
Cancer.

"The twelfth, amethyst" which means He
that destroys, destroyer of the destroyer ;
which is Leo.

Now, if we should set ourselves with all the
genius and thought we can by any means
command, could we possibly express more

THE NEW JERUSALEM. 385

clearly or fully by twelve stones the charac-
teristics of the twelve signs of the Zodiac, as
I have explained them in these Lectures y than
we thus find them set forth by these twelve
jewels of the foundation of the New Jerusa-
lem? Nay, upon what else could the golden
and eternal home of God's redeemed ones be
built but on these precious jewels of the per-
son, the character, the offices, the work, and
the achievements of that illustrious Seed of
the woman in whom standeth our salvation ?
It is wonder on wonder that these precious
stones are there, with just this significance ;
but, having this significance, and epitomizing
as they do the whole redemption-history from
first to last, I should wonder all the more if
this architectural picture of the eternal home
and blessedness of the saints did not contain
them as its foundation. And being there, in
the precise order, and in full recognition of
the precise imagery and symbolic import, of
the twelve signs of the circling year of time,
they give the stamp and seal of the final rev-
elation of the sublime and finished result of
all that fills the perturbed ages of this world
to the reality of what I have been seeking to
show ; to wit, that the mystic garniture of
these heavens, which modern science in its
33 z

386 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

vanity has chosen to regard as crude and
grotesque scribbling, is verily a writing of
God, indited by His Spirit from the beginning
to hold up to the whole race of man, in all its
branches and generations, what He has also
caused to be recorded in the Word deposited
with His own particular people touching the
course and outcome of all His grand pur-
poses in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Thus, then, has the great Almighty inscribed
the works of Nature with the symbols and
signs of His more precious works of grace,
and shown us " the secrets of wisdom, that
they are double to that which is."

" Wisdom ! that bright intelligence, which sat
Supreme when, with His golden compasses,
Th' Eternal planned the fabric of the world,
Produced His fair idea into light,
And said that all was good ! Wisdom, blest beaaa !
The brightness of the everlasting light !
The spotless mirror of the power of God !
The reflex image of the all-perfect Mind !
A stream translucent, flowing from the source
Of glory infinite — a cloudless light!"

ILecture gfcteemf).

PRIMEVAL MAN.

Job 12:12: " With the ancient is wisdom."

AFTER what we have now seen of the
presentations and connections of the
ancient astronomy, the question of its origin
becomes one of great interest and importance.
Who framed this system ? Who first so accu-
rately observed these features of Nature's celes-
tial economies, and so sublimely wove them to-
gether into one great scheme, at once so true
to fact and so full of prophetic and evangelic
significance ? Whence has all this wisdom
come ? Our investigations would be left in-
complete if we did not now endeavor to gath-
er together what information exists touching
these inquiries.

Astronomy is unquestionably one of the
most ancient of the sciences. Its history runs
back into an antiquity so remote and dim that
the Greatest 0f astronomers are unable to tell
its source or beginning. Its existence is trace-

387

388 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

able in all known asfes and amone all nations
with all its main features settled and fixed
from the most distant periods. Learned an-
tiquarians of modern times have searched
every page of heathen mythology, ransacked
all the legends of poetry and fable, traversed
all the religions, sciences, customs, and tra-
ditions of every nation, tribe, and people, and
used the best sources of historic information
the earth affords, with a view to rescue the
matter from the heavy mists hanging over it ;
but with no further success than to trace it
back to certain Chaldean shepherds who lived
in a very early period of the world ; but every-
thing else concerning it and them is left un-
discovered and untold. Had they first grasp-
ed the real meaning and intent of these pri-
meval inventions of astronomic science, or
entertained an idea of its true connections,
they doubtless would have been able to reach
much more definite knowledge on the subject.

The Facts Stated.
We now have monumental evidence, in the
Great Pyramid of Gizeh, that a very complete
and sublime knowledge of the structure and
economy of the visible universe, inclusive of
a very exact astronomy, was by some means

THE FACTS STATED. 389

known to the great architect of that unrivalled
edifice, built twenty-one hundred and seventy
years before the birth of Christ. It is also a
matter of accredited record that when Alex-
ander took Babylon, Calisthenes, the philos-
opher who accompanied the expedition, found
there certain astronomical observations made
by the Chaldeans over nineteen hundred years
before that time, which was over twenty-two
hundred years before our era, and near to the
great dispersion of mankind by the confusion
of tongues. Cassini refers to Philo for the
assertion that "Terah, the father of Abraham,
who lived more than a hundred years with
Noah, had much studied astronomy, and
taught it to Abraham," who, according to
Josephus and others, taught it to the Egyp-
tians during his sojourn in that country. It
is well known that the relieion of the ancient
Babylonians and contiguous peoples, which
consisted of the worship of the heavenly
bodies, was based throughout on astronomy,
astrology, and the starry configurations — so
much so that one was an essential part of the
other, and the two were really one. But it
is now demonstrated, from the recovered re-
mains of these ancient peoples, that the Chal-
dean religion and mythology were already
33*

39° THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

wrought out in a complete and finished sys-
tem as early as two thousand years before
the beginning of our era, so that a settled
astronomical science must necessarily have
existed a considerable period prior to that
date.

The book of Job, so far as we can ascer-
tain, is the oldest book now in the world ; and
it is a book which, more than all other books
of Holy Scripture, abounds in astronomical
allusions. Distinct and unmistakable refer-
ences are contained in it to the constellations
as we still have them. We there read of
" Arcturus with his sons," " the sweet influ-
ences of Pleiades" " the bands of Orion" and
" the fleeing Serpent." We there likewise read
of " Mazzaroth" with its " seasons " — stations,
stopping-places — which, according to the mar-
gin of our English Bible, the Jewish Targum,
and the ablest Christian interpreters, is nothing
more nor less than the Solar Zodiac. Astron-
omy, even as we now have it, was therefore
established and well understood in Job's day.
Nay, from the various astronomical references
in the book different astronomers claim to be
able to calculate the time in which Job lived,
which they give as from b. c. 2100-2200. (See
Miracle in Stone, pp. 203-206.)

THE FACTS STATED. 39 l

On the faith of the Thebaic astronomers
Ptolemy records an observation of the heliacal
rising of Sirius on the fourth day after the
summer solstice twenty-two hundred and fifty
years before Christ, which could not have been
made if there had not been among men a high
degree of astronomical knowledge preceding
that date.

Dr. Seyffarth claims it as solid truth that in
the distribution of the letters in the primitive
alphabet, which was essentially the same in
all nations, there is a record of the celestial
presentations which can occur but once in
millions of years, and which designates the
year, month, and day when Noah came out
of the ark. Our astronomy must therefore
have existed in and before Noah's time.

From internal evidences in the particular
framework and order of the Solar and Lunar
Zodiacs, Bailly was thoroughly convinced of a
state of the heavens at the time these Zodiacs
were formed which can occur only at intervals
of more than twenty-five thousand years, but
which really did exist in and about four thou-
sand years before the Christian era. Nouet,
on similar grounds, came to the same conclu-
sion. (See also Miracle in Stone, pp. 140 seq.)
On the basis of astronomy's own records,

392 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

apart from all other testimony, we are thus
inevitably carried back to a period within
the lifetime of Adam and his sons for the
original of the Zodiac, and, with it, of the
whole system of our astronomy.

The Traditions.

And to this agree the ancient sayings and
worthiest traditions of the race. The best
philosophers, the most honored poets, and
the historians who have penetrated the deep-
est into the beginnings of humanity unite in
commencing man with God and in close and
happy fellowship and communion with the
Divine Intelligence. Everywhere throughout
the world of primitive nations the first of
men were the greatest of men, the wisest,
the divinest, and the most worshipped ; and
the first aee was the Golden A^e.

Plato says : " Our first parent was the great-
est philosopher that ever existed." Baleus
says : " From Adam all good arts and human
wisdom flowed, as from their fountain. He
was the first that discovered the motions of the
celestial bodies, and all other creatures. From
his school proceeded whatever good arts and
wisdom were afterward propagated by our
fathers unto mankind ; so that whatever as-

THE TRADITIONS. 393

tronomy, geometry, and other arts contain in
them, he knew the whole thereof." Kecker-
man doubts not that " our first parents deliv-
ered over to their posterity, together with
other sciences, even logic also ; specially see-
ing they who were nearest the origin of all
things had an intellect so much the more ex-
cellent than ours by how much the more they
excelled us in length of life, firmitude of
health, and in air and food."

We learn from Medhurst that " in the early
Chinese histories the first man, named Pwan-
rooy is said to have been produced soon after
the period of emptiness and confusion, and
that he knew intuitively the relative propor-
tions of heaven and earth, with the principles
of creation and transmutation." The Ven-
didad of the Parsis affirms that God con-
versed with Yima, the great shepherd, the
first man, and taught him all the law of Na-
ture and religion. Moreri gives it as the
settled tradition that " Adam had a perfect
knowledge of sciences, and chiefly of what
related to the stars, which he taught his chil-
dren."

The Jews hold it among their traditions that
Adam wrote a book concerning the creation
of the world, and another on the Deity.

394 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Kissaeus, an Arabian writer, gives it as among
the teachings of his people that Abraham had
in his possession certain sacred writings of
Adam, Seth, and Enoch, in which were " laws
and promises, threatenings from God, and
predictions of many events ;" and it is af-
firmed of Abraham that he taught astron-
omy to the Egyptian priests at Heliopolis.

From the ancient fragments of Berosus,
Polyhistor, and Sanchoniathon, as well as
from the lately-recovered Assyrian tablets,
we learn of the existence of sacred records
which had descended from knowing men of
the earliest times, who taught the world all
the wisdom it had, and on whose instructions
and institutes none were able to improve, but
from which there was a constant tendency to
apostatize.

The ancient Egyptians called all their kings
Pharaoh, the Sim, but their traditions make
Menes, the first of their kings, the greatest
sun, from whom all wisdom and illumination
came to them. And Menes was a very near
descendant of Noah, through whom the pri-
meval wisdom was brought over from beyond
the Flood, and hence from the first fathers of
the race.

From Adam sprang Seth, who, according

THE TRADITIONS. 395

to Josephus and more ancient records, fol-
lowed his father in the pursuit of wisdom, as
did also his own descendants. It is said in
so many words that " they were the inventors
of that peculiar sort of wisdom which is con-
cerned with the heavenly bodies and their
nddr] xal au/mzcofiarr/ — condition and indications!'
Hornius says : " The first mention of letters
falls upon Seth's times ; who, being mindful
of his father's prophecy foretelling the uni-
versal dissolution of things, the one by the
Deluge, and the other by fire, being not un-
willing to extinguish his famous inventions
concerning the stars, he thought of some
monument to which he might concredit these
mysteries."

Enoch is also specially credited with spe-
cial wisdom and writing, particularly as relat-
ing to astronomy and prophecy. Bochart
writes : " I cannot but add what is found con-
cerning the same Enoch in Eusebius, out of
Eupolemus, of the Jews. He says that Abra-
ham, when he taught astrology [astronomy]
and other sciences at Heliopolis, affirmed
that the Babylonians attributed the invention
of the same to Enoch ; and that the Grecians
attribute the invention to Atlas, the same
with Enoch." Macinus, Abulfaragius, and

3S)6 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

other Arab writers say that Enoch was called
Edris, the sage, the illustrious, and that he
was skilled in astronomy and other sciences.
Baleus tells us that he was famous for proph-
ecy, and is reported as having written books
on divine matters. The Jews call him the
Great Scribe, and say that he wrote books
on sacred wisdom, especially on astronomy.
That he did record certain prophecies is at-
tested by the Epistle of Jude, which gives a
quotation from him. Origen also tells us
that it was asserted in the book of Enoch
that in the time of that patriarch the con-
stellations were already named and divided.
Arab and Egyptian authors make him the
same as the older Hermes — Hermes Tris-
megistus, the triply-great Shepherd — through
whom the wisdom of the stars and other sci-
ences were handed down to his posterity.

It was the remark of Gale on these and
such-like traditions and fragments : " We need
no way doubt but that Noah had been fully
instructed by Church-tradition from his godly
predecessors, Methuselah, Enoch, and Seth,
touching the creation of the world by God,
and particularly touching the excellent fabric
of the heavens, the nature of those celestial
bodies, their harmonious motion and order —

THE TRADITIONS. ' 397

that these celestial had a mighty influence on
all sublunary bodies, etc. These and such
like considerations, which greatly conduced
to the enhancing of the wisdom, power, and
goodness of God, we may not doubt were
very frequent in the mouths of those sons
of God before and after the Flood. And it
is the opinion of some that the whole story of
the creation written by Moses was conveyed
down even from Adam to his time by a con-
stant, uninterrupted tradition to the holy seed
and Church in all ages."

Euorubinus, treating: of the succession of
doctrine from the world's beginning, says :
" As there is one Principle of things, so also
there has been one and the same science of
Him at all times amongst all, as both reason
and monuments of many nations and letters
testify. This science, springing partly from
the first origin of men, has been devolved
through all ages unto posterity. The most
true supputation of times proves that Methu-
selah lived and might converse with Adam, as
Noah with Methuselah. Therefore Noah saw
and heard things before the Flood. More-
over, before Noah died Abraham was fifty
years old. Neither may we conceive that this
most pious man and his holy seed would con-

34

398 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ceal things of so great moment and so worthy
to be known and remembered. Therefore
from this most true cause it is most equal that
the great science of divine and human affairs
should be deduced unto following ages, though
greatly overcome by barbarism, etc. . . .
Therefore, that there has been one ana! the
same wisdom always in all men we endeavor
to persuade, not only by these reasons, but
also by those many and great examples
whereby we behold some vestiges of the
truth scattered throughout all nations. Abra-
ham was a Chaldean in whose family the an-
cient theology and the traditions of the fathers,
whereof he was heir, remained. All these
things being retained by Noah and his sons
— whence also flowed the piety and wisdom
of Job — were seen and heard by Abraham,
and so passed unto his posterity " (quoted
by Gale).

Bible Representations
According to the Scriptures, Adam lived
about seven hundred years contemporaneous-
ly with his son Seth, and about three hundred
years contemporaneously with Enoch, and died
only about one hundred years before Noah was
born. All these were holy prophets. From

BIBLE REPRESENTATIONS. 399

Luke (1 : 69, 70) and Acts (3 : 21) we learn
that there were inspired divine teachers " from
the foundation of the world " — " since the
world began." Whoever may be included in
the list, Adam, Seth, and Enoch were by far
the greatest and the most illustrious of them.
Adam from the first was in perfect fellow-
ship with the Divine Intelligence, and knew
all things that came before him by an intuitive
divine insight into their whole nature and in-
tendon. He needed no instructors, for the
light of God shone clear and unclouded upon
his soul. His whole being was in most thor-
ough accord with God and with the mind of
God, for he was the complete image of God.
His wisdom and knowledge were necessarily
higher by far than that of any other mere man
that ever lived. Even Peter Bayle agrees
that it is not contrary to the analogy of faith
nor to probability, and very proper to the
narrative in Genesis, to believe that Adam
came out of the hands of his Creator indued
with innate science, and that he did not lose
it by sin ; as the bad angels are not less know-
ing since their fall, and as crimes of learned
persons do not deprive them of that knowledge
they enjoyed before. He also passes it as de-
termined that the speculative understanding

400 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

of the first man was endowed with all the
philosophical and mathematical knowledge ot
which human nature is naturally capable.

Gale gives it as made out from the Mosaic
record that Adam without all peradventure
was the greatest amongst mere mortals that
ever the world possessed, exactly prying into
the very natures of things, and there contem-
plating those glorious ideas and characters of
created li^ht and order which the increated
Light and Divine Wisdom had impressed
thereon ; and thence he could immediately
collect and form the same into a complete
system and body of philosophy, as also most
methodically branch forth the same into the
particular sciences. Hornius argues that
"Adam, being constituted in this theatre of
the universe, was ignorant of nothing that
pertained to the mystery of Nature."

It is also a matter of inspired record that
God gave to Adam special revelations. Af-
ter his fall Jehovah made known to him His
purposes concerning the Serpent and its seed
and the woman and her Seed. The whole
Gospel revelation and promise was therein
included, and was criven to him, not for him-
self alone, but to be made known to all his
posterity as the great and only hope of man.

BIBLE REPRESENTATIONS. 40\

What Adam knew, Seth would thus also
know, and so would Enoch. And living con-
temporaneously together for more than two,
three, or five ordinary lifetimes, there was the
sublimest opportunity for them to observe,
construct, and mature just such a system as
astronomy presents, inwoven as it is with all
the great facts, features, and hopes embraced
in the promised redemption by the Seed of
the woman. In fact, it was the one great anc[
only opportunity in the history of our race
for such an accomplishment.

We know from Luke and Acts that every
one of these primeval prophets did speak
and prophesy of the raising up of " an Horn
of salvation for us," the corning of Christ to
suffer, to bring times of refreshing from the
presence of the Lord, and eventually to work
" the restitution of all things." (Compare
Luke i 167-79; Acts 3:18-26; Jude 15.)
The Bible tells us especially of Enoch's pre-
eminent intimacy and life-communion with
God, and recites certain of his predictions
which run on the precise theme we have
been reading from the constellations.

And what Adam and his believing children
did not know simply as men, they would still
know as prophets, which they certainly were
34 * 2 A

402 the gospel in the stars.

Reasonableness of the Case.
Going back, then, to that period of the
world to which we must needs go for the
origin of astronomy and the first fixing of
its great foundation-elements, we find there
the men duly capacitated for the work, duly
supplied with motive and opportunity to do
it, and such real prophets of God that in en-
tering upon it from sacred impulse they would
not fail of divine help in the matter, or of
preservation from all mistake. Under God,
they were the great founders of the world,
and were fully alive to the fact. They were
the great appointed teachers of the world
from the very nature of the case. They were
the first great prophets of the world, the
original recipients of the revelation of God's
purposes of redemption through the prom-
ised Seed of the woman, and as such were
under bonds to make known the facts, ex-
plain their import, and use every means of
recordine and transmitting to all men the
knowledge of them. They lived nearly a
thousand years, and so had ample time for
observation, study, and thorough elaboration
to bring the work to finished perfection be-
fore being required to leave it. And over

REASONABLENESS OF THE CASE. 403

them were the virgin stars, only waiting to
be named and grouped, and hung with the
records and symbols of the precious treas-
ures of promise and prophecy on which the
world's hopes depended, that they might be-
come the everlasting witnesses to men of the
God-given faith and hopes which shone in the
serene imaginations of these great grand fa-
thers of all sacred prophets. Nor can I see
why a single shade of doubt should linger in
our minds that these verily were the men who
drew these celestial hieroglyphics, named and
grouped the stars, laid out the Zodiacs and
their signs, and made the heavens a picture-
gallery for all the world, the first and great-
est that ever was made, that there mankind
might gaze and read the wondrous story of
the promised Redeemer, the redemption, and
the redeemed.

And this, and this only, will account for the
sacred reverence in which all the ancient peo-
ples held these starry emblems, and even fell
to worshipping them and ascribing to them
all sorts of divine and prophetic virtues. If
put there by inspired prophets, and explained
by them as the symbols of the divinest things
of God's revelation and promises, then can
we understand why they were so much made

404 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

of in the sacred mysteries, why they were so
seriously consulted as horoscopes, and why
the early nations lapsed into the idolatry of
worshipping them as gods. They are of ho-
liest origin, and relate to the dearest hopes
and anticipations of man ; therefore have
they been so prized in all the ages, and there-
fore the Perverter of all good set himself to
turn them to evil, for which he could have
found neither hold nor leverage had not some
great and commanding sacredness gone be-
fore to seat them in the esteem of men.

Claimed to be from God.
It was also the common and accepted doc-
trine of antiquity that the constellations were
divine in origin and sacred in character. They
are woven in with all the old ethnic religions.
Much as heathenism has perverted them to
false worship, it has ever held to the belief
that they are from God — manifestations of the
one supreme and eternal Deity. Even Pluche
agrees that all heathenism is " nothing but the
religion of the patriarchs corrupted by extrav-
agant additions, transforming the signs, or the
symbolic men and animals, into so many gods,
with which their imagination peopled the
heaven." But this assumes and implies that

CLAIMED TO BE FROM GOD. 405

these signs in the hands of the patriarchs
themselves were connected with their relief-
ion ; and their religion being divine, so must
these signs connected with it have been.

The Greek Sallustius treats of the myths
and the constellations as undoubtedly of di-
vine origin, and represents the chief poets
through whom they came as prophets — per-
sons to whom Deity was propitious, and who
were really deoXynroi — divinely-inspired men.

The Roman Cicero affirms that these things
were explained in the sacred mysteries as part
of a divine instruction how to live in peace
and die in hope, and hence as from God him-
self.

Maimonides states that the old Jewish fa-
thers considered and held these signs in the
heavens to be of divine original.

Josephus and the Arabian authors give it
as a matter of historic truth that the primeval
prophets invented these signs.

Gale lays it down as quite certain that " the
first human institutors or authors of philoso-
phy we«e indeed divinely illuminated ; so that
the wis lorn we find scattered up and down
among the pagan philosophers was but bor-
rowed and derived from those divine lights
who we:e enlightened by the Divine Word —

406 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

that Life and Light of men which shined in the
darkness." He also adds that "both Alber-
tus and Sixtus Senensis collect that our Sa-
viour was in some manner adumbrated in the
Gentile fables and figures," implying that they
certainly were originally from the Spirit of
prophecy.

The sacred Bundahis of the Parsis gives
an account of the formation of the Solar and
Lunar Zodiacs, and mentions by name the
twelve signs of the one, almost entirely as
we now have them, and the twenty-eight di-
visions of the other, together with their Zend
names, and asserts and claims that both, to-
gether with the assignment of the stars to
each, were the work of Auharmazd, the Cre-
ator, " supreme in omniscience and goodness
and unrivalled in glory ;" and says that such
was the teaching of Zorathost, the great tra-
ditional prophet of God.

The same is asserted and claimed in the
Chaldean tablets of late recovered from the
ruins of ancient Assyria and Babylon. Frag-
ments of a whole library of books written on
tiles or tablets of pottery, now in the British
Museum, have been brought to light, and
their cuneiform records deciphered. Among
them is a poetic legend of Izdnbar, supposed

CLAIMED TO BE FROM GOD. \0"

to be the same as Nimrod, which is framed
throughout to the twelve signs of the Zodiac,
proving that the Zodiac existed and was most
highly prized when that legend was written,
certainly not less than two thousand years
before Christ.

But more important than this is a series on
the six days of the Creation, called " the Chal-
dean Genesis," almost the same in substance
with the Mosaic account, and certainly dating
beyond two thousand years before the Chris-
tian era. Smith and Sayce state concerning
this series that " the fifth tablet relates how
God created the constellations of the stars, the
signs of the Zodiac, the planets and other
stars, the moon and the sun." The whole
record runs thus :

" Ann [the supreme and ever-living God]
made suitable the mansions of the (seven)
great gods. [The signs of the Zodiac were
always considered by the heathen nations the
Mansions, stations, or resting-places of the
seven planets, deemed the great gods.] The
stars He placed in them. The lumasi, their
animal appearance [figures], He fixed. He
arranged the year according to the bounds,
the limits [of the Zodiac], which He defined.
For each of the twelve months three stars,

408 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

or rows of stars [Decans], He fixed. From
the day when the year issues forth unto the
close He marked the mansions [Zodiacal sta-
tions] of the wandering stars (planets), to
know their courses, that they might not err
or deflect at all."

There can be no question of the reference
in this extract to the Zodiac, its twelve signs,
and the system of the constellations in gen-
eral, including their figures. It answers to
the declaration in Genesis that God placed
the starry lights in the firmament, and said,
" Let them be for signs!' And the remarkable
point in the case is, that it was the sacred
opinion and settled belief of those who orig
inally composed what these tablets record
that the Zodiac, with its twelve signs, and the
three extra rows of the constellations and the
pictures designating them, were all the work
of Almighty God himself by inspiration, im-
pulse, and direction of His Spirit. It is in-
deed nothing more than we read out of Job,
who wrote about the same period or a little
earlier ; but it is as if old Babylonia had risen
up from its grave of ages to corroborate and
attest the meaning which we took from the
patriarch of Uz, where he gives it as part of
Jehovah's glory that " by His Spirit He gar-

CLAIMED TO BE FROM GOD. 409

nished the heavens," and that " His hand
hath formed the fleeing Serpent," and hence
all these celestial emblems (Job 26 : 13).*

* The ordinary explanations of the origin of these ancient pictures
extend very little further than the Zodiac ; but even as to that our
men of science have nothing to give save a few jejune imaginings,
lame and absurd in themselves, and without the slightest show of
fact on which to lean.

It is said that herdsmen used to take great delight in their sheep
and cattle as they led them forth in spring-time, and in the mating
and nesting of the birds as the summer drew on, and so they gave
the signs of a Ram, a Bull, and two entwined youths to the months
of March, April, and May ! Men saw, we are told, that toward the
end of June the sun began to come down from the north toward the
south, which for some unknown reason they likened to a backward
movement, and so gave that month the sign of the Crab, because the
crab is apt to move backward ! The heat in July became fierce, and
then, we are assured, the lions used to come to the river to quench
their thirst, and so that month obtained the sign of the Lion ! Then
in August, it is supposed, the people began to harvest or to sow
their fields, and so they gave that month the sign of a prostrate
young woman with sprigs of wheat in one hand and a branch in the
other ! In September, it is said, they found the days and nights near-
ly equal, so they drew for that month the sign of the Scales, though
the same thing in March had no sign, and these equal balances, un-
fortunately for the myth, have one side up and the other down !
October, it is said, was plentiful in fruits, and many people got sick,
so they marked that month with the sign of the Scorpion ! Novem-
ber, it is said, was the month for hunting, and so they marked it
with the sign of a Horseman with bow and arrow. In December,
we are told, people noticed the sun again ascending toward the
north, and so they marked that month with the sign of a Goat, be-
cause goats like to climb rocks ! January was found to be a wet
and dreary month, so they gave it the sign of the Waterman ! And
in February we are told that people went a-fishing, and so that month
received the sign of the two Fishes ! This is the philosophy of the
twelve signs as given in our books of science.

But then how came these signs to be the same in all parts of the
earth in all the ages through ? And how comes it that there is not
35

4io the gospel in the stars.

The Star- Record Itself.
And the story which these astronomic signs
and pictures tell is in all respects so worthy
of a divine origin, and so much above man's
science, that we may well consider the whole
thing divine. It is precisely the same that we
find in the Word, about whose divine source
we have no question. And if it was a fitting
thing for the great Lord of all to employ His
Spirit to cause these matters of salvation to
be authentically recorded in the books com-
mitted to His later peoples, why was it not
equally befitting His gracious almightiness

a country under the sun where these interpretations all fit ? And
how did men know to name these months or to place these figures if
the sphere had not been previously defined and fixed ? And what
of the thirty-six remaining constellations and their equally conspicu-
ous figures ? Where did they all come from, and what do they mean ?
The Greek myths on the subject are out of the question here. These
extra-Zodiacal constellations are as old as the Zodiac itself, and
everywhere, in the earliest records as in the latest, appear along with
it. And what of the names of the stars, which, for the most part,
are as old as the signs, but tell quite another story from anything that
men have thus given as the rationale of these celestial hieroglyphics ?
And then, again, how did it happen that the people who thus fanci-
fully characterized the months immediately wheeled about and began
to consult as oracles and to worship as great divinities the very fig-
ures which they had themselves hung up? Such philosophy will
not hold together. It is simply amazing that learned men should
have the face to put it forth for rational acceptance. It is so purely
fanciful, so feeble, and so manifestly untrue, that it needed no Mon-
tucla to demolish it utterly.

THE STAR-RECORD ITSELF. 4 1 1

to do the same in the case of His primeval
prophets, that all mankind in all the ages
might ever have before their eyes the abiding
testimony of His pristine revelations concern-
ing that same Messiah " of whom Moses in
the Law and the Prophets did write"?

And what if the key to the showings was
afterward lost, and men only misread and per-
verted what was so sublimely recorded ? The
same has occurred again and again with the
scriptural records ; and why should the apos-
tasies in the one case argue differently from
what they do in the other ? The failures and
sins of men do not unmake the truth of God,
neither do their misuses and perversions of
His gifts disprove their divine source or good
intent. The turning of Israel's calling and
sacred institutes into a hypocritical, murder-
ous, and depraved Pharisaism, which killed
the Son of God and slew His holy Apostles,
did not unmake the divine legation of Mo-
ses nor the heavenly inspiration of the holy
prophets who spent their lives building Israel
into a kingdom for the Lord. The perver-
sion of Christianity into an imperial pope-
dom, an Antichrist, and a tyrannous perse-
cution of the saints of God by His own al-
leged vicegerent did not prove Jesus of Naz-

412 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

areth an impostor nor the testimony of His
Apostles undivine or untrue. And if men
in like manner have perverted these primeval
records in the stars, and turned the showings
of promised salvation into an instrument of
damning superstition, and twisted a divine
astronomy into a devilish astrology, and de-
veloped a bloody paganism out of a primitive
evangelism, what is it else than the depravity
of man and the trick of the great Deceiver
belying God, but by no means discrediting or
unmaking the divinity, the mercifulness, or
the gracious ampleness of good intent in the
sublime original ?

Volney insists, and with good reason, that
everywhere in antiquity there was a cherish-
ed tradition of an expected Conqueror of the
Serpent, who was to come as a divine person,
born of a woman ; and that this tradition is
most clearly reflected in the constellations
and in all the heathen mythologies through-
out the world. Dupuis has collected numer-
ous ancient authorities, abundantly proving
that in all nations this tradition, with singular
particularity of details, always prevailed ; that
this divine Person, born of a woman, was to
be a great sufferer in His conflict with the
Serpent, but would triumph gloriously at the

THE STAR-RECORD ITSELF. 413

last ; and that this tradition is represented
and recorded in the constellations.

By a world-wide testimony we are thus as-
sured that this is verily the inwoven mystic
essence of the primeval astronomy, the same
that constitutes the essence of all that is writ-
ten by inspiration in the books of the Bible.

And to the external testimony the internal
substance and conditions correspond. In three
grand parts or books, each with four grand
chapters, and each chapter divided into four
distinct sections, is this record given. Set out
in brief, the contents would run thus :

BOOK FIRST— THE REDEEMER PROMISED.
Chapter First — Virgo:

1. The Seed of the woman ;

2. The Desire of nations ;

3. The Man of double nature in humil-

iation ;

4. The exalted Shepherd and Harvester.

Chapter Second — Libra:

1. Price to be paid ;

2. The Cross endured ;

3. The Victim slain ;

4. The Crown purchased.

35*

414 the gospel in the stars.

Chapter Third — Scorpio :

i. Cleft in the conflict;

2. The Serpent's coils ;

3. The struggle with the Enemy ;

4. The toiling Vanquisher of evil.

Chapter Fourth — Sagittarius :

1. The double-natured One triumphing as

a Warrior ;

2. He gladdens the heavens ;

3. He builds the fires of punishment ;

4. He casts down the Dragon.

BOOK SECOND— THE REDEEMER'S PEOPLE.

Chapter First — Capricornus :

1. Life out of Death ;

2. The Arrow of God ;

3. Pierced and falling ;

4. Springing up again in abundant life.

Chapter Second — Aquarius :

1 . Life-waters from on high ;

2. Drinking in the heavenly flood;

3. Carrying and speeding the Good News ;

4. Bearing aloft the Cross over all the

earth.

the star-record itself. 415

Chapter Third — Pisces:

1. Swimming in the heavenly waters;

2. Upheld and governed by the Lamb ;

3. Head over all things to the Church ;

4. The intended Bride bound and exposed

on earth.

Chapter Fourth — Aries:

1. The Lamb entered on dominion;

2. The Bride released and making ready;

3. Satan bound ;

4. The Breaker triumphin

BOOK THIRD— REDEMPTION COMPLETED.

Chapter First — Taurus :

1. The invincible Ruler come;

2. The sublime Vanquisher ;

3. The River of Judgment ;

4. The all-ruling Shepherd.

Chapter Second — Gemini :

1. The Marriage of the Lamb;
r>. The Enemy trodden down ;

3. The Prince coming in glory ;

4. His princely following.

4l6 the gospel in the stars.

Chapter Third — Cancer :

i. The Possession secured;
r. Lesser Fold, the first-born, the rulers;
3. Greater Fold, the after-born ;
*. The Heroes landed from their expedi
tion, their toils and trials over.

Chapter Fourth — Leo:

1 . The King aroused for the rending ;

2. The Serpent fleeing;

3. The Bowl of Wrath upon him ;

4. His carcass devoured.

Here is a marked order and symmetry of
construction, a thoroughness of digestion, an
assortment of elements, an evenness of bal-
ance, and an exhaustive comprehensiveness,
not excelled by the highest inspired genius
whose writings have come to us — an order
befitting the God of order, and bearing in
itself, in its three and fours, the expression
of eternal Godhead moving and doing with
reference to earth and man ; whilst every
topic in the twelve and twelve times three
is a genuine Gospel topic, handled exactly as
we find it in the writings of the Prophets and
Apostles. There is nothing added and there

INEVITABLE INFERENCES. 417

is nothing left out. The whole story is com-
plete— rmore complete than half the ministers
in Christendom can tell it to-day with the
whole volume of both Testaments before
them, and after all the prophesying and preach-
ing and fulfilling that has occurred in the five
thousand years and more since these star-pic-
tures were made.

Inevitable Inferences.
" What shall we say, then, to these things?"
Was primeval man a gorilla, a troglodyte, a
brutish savage, a wild man without know-
ledge ? The Zodiac and the constellations as
arranged upon the ancient sphere furnish the
foundations of all astronomy. No man since
they were made has been able to improve
upon them. All subsequent touches of them
have been bungles and absurdities. They
stand to-day securely planted among the
profoundest stabilities contained in human
science. And yet the evidences are that they
have come down to us from that selfsame
primeval man. Then primeval man knew
the visible starry heavens as well as any
other man since. Then primeval man could
draw maps, and make pictures, and write
books, and teach wisdom, and transmit thought

2 B

41 8 THE GOSPEL IK THE STARS.

and intelligence, just as successfully as the re-
moter progeny sprung from his blood. Then
the doctrine that modern man is a mere ev-
olution from savageism, the result of a self-
moved activity to become, his makership his
own, his intelligence a mere self-efflores-
cence, is a lie.

Our particular ancestors of two thousand
years ago may have been but semi-civilized,
having been long and remotely separated
from the chief centres of population and en-
lightenment, and so it may have been in part
with the progenitors of the Greeks and Ro-
mans ; but the agencies and influences by
which they were lifted, and their descendants
brought to the heights of which we boast too
much, were not originated and evolved from
among themselves, apart from what they got
from the more knowing world outside. Egypt,
Phoenicia, Arabia, Assyria, Chaldea, India, and
China of the olden times never were savage
or uncivilized. Government, society, law, arts,
and sciences go back to the beginnings of
their history, and from them all later peoples
have learned. As far as we have any traces
of man's existence — and those traces go back
as far as Adam — we have evidences of en-
lightenment as high and as true to Nature

INEVITABLE INFERENCES. 419

and fact as anything we know, and which is
to this day the very backbone of much of the
world's best and highest wisdom. The weight
of the showing is, that primeval man was the
truest model and representative of man, and
that all human progress since, though upward
in some things, has been in the main an un-
ceasing deterioration.

All the world that came next after primeval
man honored, and even worshipped, their first
fathers as very gods of light, knowledge, and
greatness. They pushed their veneration to
a base idolatry indeed, but there was reason
and deserved gratitude at the bottom of it.
The world now-a-days regards such reverence
as a weakness and a fault, and has swung off
into a far meaner and baser idolatry of self,
glorying in its earth-born gaslight as the
superlative illumination, and floundering like
the dazed moth around the flickering smoke-
flame, as if the sun in the heavens were not
half so bright and beautiful. Could Adam
and Seth and Enoch and Noah appear among
us, and take an inventory of our prevailing
philosophies, the ways in which modern think-
ing practically runs, and the atheistic stuff
which many would baptize with the name of
wisdom, how would those venerable patriarchs

420 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

sigh and lament and sicken over the degen-
eration of their posterity ! What if we have
found out that a wire magnetized at one end
is instantly magnetized at the other end also ?
What if we have discovered that there is
power in boiling water to push against con-
finement, and so to drive pistons and turn
wheels ? What if we have made up short-
hand ways of putting lettering on paper and
of multiplying impressions like autumn leaves ?
What if we have succeeded in making war-
guns and implements of death such as they
never saw and never wished to see ? From
the high standpoint of those primeval sages
Noah would have to write again : " Behold,
the earth is corrupt, for all flesh hath corrupt-
ed its ways." Intenser than ever would Enoch
fulmine his ancient commination : " Behold,
the Lord cometh with ten thousand of His
saints to execute judgment upon this convict
population, full of ungodly deeds and ungodly
speeches, traducing the things which it knows
not, and following only what it knows natural-
ly as brute beasts." Whilst Adam's thoughts
would needs turn inward with all the deeper
self-reproach for having with open eyes start-
ed the spring whence has come all this earthi-
ness and apostasy.

INEVITABLE INFERENCES. 42 1

" What shall we say, then, to these things ?"
God certainly did not make man without at
the same time beaming- into him all the light
and intelligence to equip him fully for all the
requirements of the highest perfection of his
being in his sphere, and for the intellectual and
physical mastery of the whole earthly creation
at the head of which he stood. That first man
fell, but that fall did not obliterate from his
intellect the knowledge which his Maker had
previously shined into it. An apostate from
Christianity does not thereby lose the know-
ledge he possessed. Judgment came upon
Adam, and hard necessities, by reason of his
transgression, but there was no obliteration
of his intellectual treasures or his intellectual
powers. Much as they have depreciated in
transmission to his posterity, they were not
blotted out of Adam himself. Neither did
God cease to speak to him, or refuse to open
up to him new and richer fields of wisdom to
meet his condition as a sinner. Fallen Adam
was still capable of redemption, and that re-
demption God meant to accomplish in the
course of the ongoing ages and generations
of the race. To save Adam it was necessary
that Adam should know of it, and to save his
posterity it was necessary that the same know-

422 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ledge should be transmitted to them also.
And as from him human life was multiplied,
so to him it pertained as the great father to
teach and transmit his sacred and saving wis-
dom with the multiplication of himself. In
the nature and necessities of the case he
was God's prophet to those born of him. Of
all knowledge, the knowledge of the promised
Redeemer was the most important and essen-
tial. Therefore God would not leave him in
any ignorance as to that promised Redeemer,
the nature of His work, and the results of His
administrations. The whole Gospel, or none,
he needed to know. The whole Gospel, if
any, he would be most anxious to comprehend.
The whole Gospel, as he got it from God and
hoped and rejoiced in it himself, he would be
most concerned to teach to his children and
to have securely recorded for all coming gen-
erations. Such devout and active fidelity was
his interest and duty as a man and a prophet,
and what God, according to all His word and
promises, would certainly approve and bless
and help. It would be in the line and spirit
of all His subsequent inspirations vouchsafed
to men that He should do for Adam in such
a case even more than He did for Moses and
Samuel and Isaiah and Daniel. And here, in

INEVITABLE INFERENCES. 423

the records and emblems of the stars, demon-
strably dating back to Adam's time, and link-
ed in with a true and admirable astronomy, we
have what in every particular best resolves
itself into a pictorial memorial of that prom-
ised Redeemer's character and achievements
as then looked for and believed in. The
things thus symbolized could never have
become known from natural reason, neither
could unaided man ever have made for them
so perfect and sublime a record even after
they were known. Then certainly God's
hand was in it. Then divine revelation is a
demonstrated reality. Then inspiration is an
indestructible fact. And then these glorious
stars take on the holier brightness as the
sublime underwriters of our Scriptures, and
as God's witnesses from beyond the gulf of
aees to assure us there is no mistake in build-
ing on Jesus of Nazareth as our hope and our
salvation. Well, then, might Zacharias sing:
" Blessed be the Lord God of Israel ; for
He hath visited and redeemed His people,
and hath raised up an Horn of salvation for
us in the house of His servant David ; as He
spake by the mouth of His holy prophets, which
have been since the world began /" Luke i :
68-70.

Hecture jjebenteattl).

THE STAR OF BETHLEHEM.

Matt. 2:2: " We have seen His star in the east, and are come to
worship Him."

A LEARNED Christian antiquarian has
expressed his belief " that far more
conclusive proofs of the promise of a Re-
deemer can be found in the primeval tradi-
tions of our race than even in the Hebrew
Scriptures." He may'perhaps have expressed
himself a little too strongly, for the Old Tes-
tament, rightly read, is very full of the Mes-
sianic hope. But it is a great mistake to
consign to the Evil One the whole human
family outside of Judaism prior to the time
of Christ, and thus to brand almost the en-
tire race with the mark of Cain. It may
have the guise of orthodoxy, but it lacks the
element of truth. The case which comes
before us in connection with the text effect-
ually confutes it.

It must also go very far toward establish-
ing the doctrines which I have been pro-

424

THE VISIT OF THE MAGI. 425

pounding respecting the source and intent
of the primeval astronomy to be able to find
a case so clear and well authenticated in
which the study and observation of the stars,
in connection with the primitive traditions,
have served to fix in Gentile minds a living
belief in a Virgin-born Redeemer — a know-
ledge so complete as to embrace the time
and place of His advent and to bring them
in humble adoration around His infant cradle.
Nor can we do better, in bringing these stud-
ies to a close, than by devoting a final Lecture
to the consideration of this case.

The Visit of the Magi.
For a thousand years and more Christen-
dom has been inquiring and wondering, Who
were " the wise men from the East" that came
to Jerusalem asking about a new-born Jewish
Prince ? How came they to know about Him ?
What were those starry indications to which
they referred as having induced them to make
such costly and laborious search for Him ?
What were the sources of illumination by
which they were thus brought to honor and
worship Him in His lowly infant couch ? For
fourteen hundred years and more the Church
has been observing a festival in commemora-

36*

426 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

tion of their visit, and made it the initiation
of a season of her calendar scarcely inferior
in prominence to the greatest of her sacred
festivals and seasons. All Christian litera-
ture from the earliest centuries is full of com-
ments and homilies and songs and liturgical
prescriptions relating to the same. The first
book of the New Testament places it close
to the beginning of its account of the Sa-
viour as a special testimony to His dignity
as the King of the Jews and His worship-
fulness as the Son of God. The apocryphal
Gospels of the Infancy set it forth with great
zest and circumstantiality as one of the di-
vinest gems in the testimonies to the glory
of Jesus of Nazareth. And neither in ser-
mon nor in song is there any one thing, save
and except the Cross and the Resurrection,
which is more joyously contemplated than
this so-called " Star of Bethlehem."

Diverse Opinions.
But when it comes to the explanation of
particulars, Christians have not been so clear
nor so well agreed as we would expect in a
matter of so much prominence and interest.
The diversities of opinion are almost endless,
and the Christian world as yet has not settled

DIVERSE OPINIONS. 427

itself down upon any one theory as certainly
the truth or of sufficient clearness to be free
from serious difficulties and objections on the
one hand or the other.

As to the starry leading spoken of, some
think it was a meteor or a comet. Others
think it was the bright light which shone
upon the shepherds when the angel made
known to them Christ's birth, assuming that
to men afar off that remarkable light may
have been mistaken for a star. Some think
it was some unidentified supernatural light
in the sky which appeared to certain devout
men in some remote region, and which they
could no better describe than to liken it to a
star. Some think it was a true star among the
stars, brought into being, or at least brought
into view, for the particular purpose of giving
token of the Saviour's nativity, and then made
to disappear, never more to be seen. Some
think there was no real external manifesta-
tion at all, that no star was ever seen by any
one, and that the whole thing was only a vis-
ion vouchsafed to these men alone.

Of later years it is more generally sup-
posed to have been a conjunction of the
planets Jupiter and Saturn, such as did act-
ually occur about that time, and which may

428 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

have entered somewhat into the case, al-
though the conjunctions referred to were not
close enough to create the appearance of a
single star, and were not in any respect what
could with propriety be called Christ's Star.
Admitting all that Jewish rabbis as well as
the Gentile astrologists and prognosticators
have claimed for such conjunctions, there still
would be a great lack to account adequately
for the very definite and powerful convictions
respecting Christ's birth which these men
showed, and for their reference to an indi-
vidual star, which they described as the star
of the .new-born Prince they were seeking.
True, Tacitus, Suetonius, Josephus, and others
testify that there was at that time a widespread
expectation of some great and triumphing
Prince to arise in the East ; but said expec-
tation was so indefinite, and was actually ap-
plied in directions so unaccordant with the
true Messiah and His predicted character,
that it cannot be taken as at all up to what
was in the mind of these Magi and implied
in their inquiry. They expected to find a di-
vine and worshipful being, by birth a Jewish
Prince, and by character and right entitled to
the homage of all the children of men. They
had no question or doubt upon the subject.

DIVERSE OPINIONS. 429

They knew that a great and wonderful per-
sonage was born. They knew and believed
that He was worthy of the sacred worship of
all men, and that it was their holiest interest
and duty to come and greet Him with their
best gifts, acknowledgments, and adoration.
This was more than the prevailing expecta-
tion anywhere showed.

Whence, then, came this clear and definite
knowledge on the subject, exceeding even
that of the sacred scribes and priests of Ju-
dea itself, with all the records and foreshow-
ings of Moses and the prophets before them ?
The prophecy of Balaam touching the Star
that was to arise out of Jacob may have had
some remote connection with it, but it will
scarcely begin to account for the clear, un-
doubting, and living faith touching the new-
born Saviour which glowed in the hearts of
these wise men. Prophecies of Daniel and
influences of the Jewish teachings in general
may also have floated down among these
people from the great Captivity times ; but,
at the best, it would still not account for what
we see exhibited in these Magi. A special
revelation to them alone, without any further
record of it on earth, would be so unlike what
we know of God's methods and purposes in

43° THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

the giving of His revelations that it is un-
warranted to suppose it.

How, then, did these Magi come to know
so much about Christ as an adorable Kine
and Saviour? How came they to such full
conviction that His birth had occurred in Ju-
dea ? The true answer is : By the signs and
constellations of the primeval astronomy, and the
legends connected with them, interpreted as we
have been contemplating them in these Lectures.

Astronomic Facts.

It is an astronomic fact, independent of all
hypotheses, that at the precise hour of mid-
night, at the winter solstice, or the last week
of December, in the period in which Christ
was born, the sign of Virgo, everywhere and
always regarded as the sign of the virgin-
mother from whom the divine-human Re-
deemer-King was to be born, was just rising
on the eastern horizon.

It is a further astronomical fact, independent
of all hypotheses, that at the spring equinox
of the same period, just nine months earlier,
this sign of the Virgin at midnight was on the
meridian, with the line running precisely across
her bosom.

It is a further independent astronomical

A PRIMEVAL TRADITION. 43 l

fact that at the same date, at midnight, the
stars of the little constellation of Coma, the
special sign of the infant Seed of the woman,
the Desire of nations, was likewise, along with
the Virgin, directly on the meridian.

Now, if our interpretation of these ancient
astronomical signs be the true one, we have
here some remarkable indications in which
the facts and the signs singularly coincide.
Taken by themselves, they might not mean
much ; but if other particulars, to be named,
duly fill out the picture, they would help to
fix the heavenly tokens that the time had in
very truth come in which the great Virgin-
born Deliverer was to appear. They are im-
portant factors in the case.

A Primeval Tradition.
It is also a matter of record, among both
Gentile and Jewish peoples, that the patriarch
Seth, in whose day these heavenly signs were
arranged and completed, gave out a prophecy
in connection with them, that in the period in
which the great promised One should be born
there would appear a very bright star in the
heavens. This was perhaps the very proph-
ecy traditional among the ancient Magi and
Parsis. that there should come a heavenly

432 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Child to command the homage and obedience
of mankind, the sign of whose birth would be
the appearance of a new and peculiar star in
the sign of Virgo. Likewise, the Jews also
have always held and taught that Messiah' s
advent would be heralded by a new and pecu-
liar star. Hence the great impostor who gave
himself out as their Messiah called himself
Barcokheba, " the Son of the Star."

A New Star.
Now, it is a matter of record that a new
and peculiar star did make its appearance in
the first Decan of Virgo in the period imme-
diately preceding Christ's birth, and that it
was so bright as to be visible even in the day-
time. Ignatius says it " sparkled brilliantly
above all stars." The same continued in
the sky during the whole period of Christ's
lifetime, and for a time thereafter. Hip-
parchus, about one hundred and twenty-five
years before Christ, observed it as a new star,
and was led by it to draw up his catalogue of
the stars. Ptolemy, about one hundred and
fifty years after Christ, refers to it as having
been observed by Hipparchus, but as having
become so faint as hardly to be any longer
distinguishable. The Chinese records also

A NEW STAR. 433

make mention of this new bright star at a
time corresponding to the period of our Sa-
viour's birth. Since the time of Ptolemy we
have no record of any observation of it. This
star was in Coma, the sign of the Infant ac-
companying Virgo, and it marked the very
head of that Infant. It was on the meridian
at midnight at the spring equinox, just nine
months before Christ was born, as again
three months thereafter. Its brightness would
necessarily arrest the attention of observers
of the heavens, and awaken special interest
in Coma and the Virgin-born Infant which that
constellation signified both in figure and name.
Believers in the sacred meaning of these signs,
especially in connection with the traditional
prophecy of the new star, which seems also
to have been in Balaam's mind, could not
help but be convinced from these showings
that the coming of the Desired One was sure-
ly approaching. It was a sort of midnight cry,
"Behold, He cometh!" The star itself would
thus also be just what these Magi called the
star by which they were led — namely, Christ's
Star, emphatically " His star ;" for it was a
star of His particular constellation as the De-
sire of nations, and the peculiar star of His
infancy, as it marked the Infant's head, and

37 2 C

434 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

was at the time by far the brightest in the
constellation, as well as in all the heavens
around.

To believers in the import of these signs
as I have given them there could be no ques-
tion about the meaning of these indications.
But still, the time would remain far more in-
definite than it seems to have been in the
minds of these distinguished visitors. There
needed to be some further and more sharply-
narrowed indications to account for the whole
case in this line of explanation. But such
more definite indications were not wanting.

Conjunctions of Jupiter and Saturn.
In the rabbinical commentaries of Abar-
banel, Eliezer, and others great stress is laid
on conjunctions of the planets Jupiter and
Saturn. It is there also affirmed that about
three years before the birth of Moses a con-
junction between Jupiter and Saturn occurred
in the sign of Pisces. By astronomical cal-
culations we know that such a conjunction of
these particular planets in that particular sign
did take place about that period. According
to Josephus and the rabbis, this sign was in-
terpreted by the Egyptian astronomers and
wise men as very favorable to the Jews and

CONJUNCTIONS OF JUPITER AND SATURN 435

very unfavorable to the Egyptians. Their
sacred scribes, noted for their skill and sa-
gacity in these things, came to the king in-
sisting that it foretokened the birth of a
child among the Jews who, if allowed to
live, would bring the Egyptian dominion
very low, excel in virtue and glory, exalt
the children of Israel to power and honor,
and be remembered throughout all ages.
(See Josephus, Ant. ii. 9, §§ 2 and 27.)

Three things here come out with great
clearness and conspicuity which deserve to
be particularly noted : first, that the star-
reading of a conjunction between Jupiter and
Saturn betokened the birth of a great, vir-
tuous, princely, and glorious operator among
men, and the beginning or starting of a new
order of things ; * second, that the sign in
which the conjunction occurred indicated
the people among whom the child was to
be born ; and third, that the children of Israel
were already at that early period associated
with the sien of Pisces.

* Kepler, on consulting the periods of the conjunctions between
Jupiter and Saturn, gave it as his opinion that such conjunctions as-
tronomically coincided with the approach of each climacteric in
human affairs; to wit, the revelation to Adam, the birth of Enoch,
the Deluge, the birth of Moses, the birth of Cyrus, the birth of
Christ, the birth of Charlemagne, and the birth of Luther.

43^ THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Josephus says that it was in consequence
of what the scribes augured from these indi-
cations that the decree went forth from Pha-
raoh to slay every male child that should be
born during the time impending.

We thus have the Jewish rabbis and the
Gentile Egyptian scribes most seriously, on
both sides, concurring in the interpretation
of some very important points in astronomic
indications, and may well conclude that their
views and teachings with regard to these par-
ticulars were the same that held on the sub-
ject among the learned in such lore through-
out the world in general, including the wise
men who asked the question of the text
Abarbanel, in his Commentary on Daniel,
affirms it as a settled thing that the conjunc-
tion of Jupiter and Saturn always betokens
some great event or beginning in human af-
fairs, and because such a conjunction occurred
in his day (about a. d. 1480), he expected the
speedy birth of the Messiah, as still expected
by the Jews.

Now, if an individual and isolated conjunc
tion of these two planets presaged the birth
of one so illustrious as Moses, and always
indicates the coming of some great one on
earth, what would be the dignity and glory

CONJUNCTIONS OF JUPITER AND SATURN. 437

of a Child whose birth is heralded by three
successive conjunctions of these same planets
in one and the same year ? And yet this is
what, in fact, did occur just before the birth
of Jesus of Nazareth.

In the year of Rome 747, within the two
years preceding the Nativity, during the last
days of May, there was one such conjunction.
In the same year, during the last days of Octo-
ber there was another such conjunction. And
again in the same year, during the first days
of December, there was a third conjunction —
all three being conjunctions of Jupiter and
Saturn, as on the occasion of the birth of
Moses. It was Kepler, the great German
astronomer, who first pointed out these re-
markable incidents of the heavens, and gave
the opinion that they were most likely the
starry phenomena which influenced the wise
men in the case before us. The calculations
on the subject have been repeatedly re-ex-
amined, and latest by the astronomer-royal
at Greenwich, and pronounced to be correct,
Independent of all theories or interpreta-
tions, the facts thus stand attested by the
best science, and, as Farrar says, " do not
seem to admit of denial."

And as the star in the head of the Virgin-

37 *

438 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

born Infant was at the time shining with a
peculiar brilliancy new to it and brighter than
all other fixed stars in the firmament, those
who took the conjunctions of Jupiter and Sat-
urn as indicating the near birth of a lordly
and illustrious operator in human affairs
could by no means help themselves from
the conclusion that here was the astronomic
showing of the pending birth of a triply-illus-
trious One, who could be none other than
that divine-human Seed of the woman every-
where set forth in the constellations, and
promised and hoped for among all nations
from the foundations of the world. These
wise men would thus know, and be assured
beyond all doubt or misgiving, that the par-
ticular time had come in which the worshipful
One they were seeking was to make His ad-
vent. Such portentous conjunctions, along
with the new star in Coma, and the Virgin
herself on the meridian at the same time,
would seal the whole matter. The signs
were full, definite, and complete.

The Sign of the Fishes.
And as to His being born in Judea as a
Jewish Prince, that they would know from the
same signs, just as well as the Egyptian priests

THE SIGN CF THE FISHES. 439

knew from the conjunction of the same plan-
ets many centuries before that tKe illustrious
one they held to be presaged at that time was
to arise from among the seed of Jacob. The
conjunction occurred in Pisces, the sign of the
Fishes; and the sign of the Fishes, by Jews
and Gentiles alike, was assigned to the Israel-
itish people as to the Sethites and Shemites,
who held to the worship of one only God and
His holy promises over against apostates and
unbelievers. Abarbanel argues five reasons
for the reference of the sign of Pisces to Is-
rael. In our explanations the sign of the
Fishes means the earthly Church, and the seed
of Jacob at that time constituted God's chosen
and acknowledged people. And, as a matter
of astronomic fact, all three of the conjunctions
between Jupiter and Saturn which immediate-
ly preceded Christ's birth were in the sign of
the Fishes — the first in the twentieth degree,
the second in the sixteenth degree, and the
third in the fifteenth decree. With the same
clearness and loudness, therefore, with which
these planetary conjunctions and stellar indi-
cations announced the immediate birth of the
glorious divine-human Seed of the woman,
did they also announce that He was to arise
out of Jacob and to be a Jewish Prince.

44° the gospel in the stars.

The Following of the Star.

It was in December, at the winter solstice,
then the twenty-fifth day of the month, that
Christ was born. It was most likely in the
following March, about the time of the spring
equinox, at the first anniversary of the angel's
annunciation to Mary, that these wise men
reached Jerusalem. The Church mostly puts
it a little earlier, but without very solid chro-
nological reasons. It was at this time that
the bright star in Coma was vertical at Jeru-
salem at midnight. The record plainly im-
plies that these men were following the star
they spoke of as Christ's Star. The follow-
ing of the star in Coma, so emphatically the
star of the infant Seed of the woman, could be
no other following than the going to the place
at which it would be thus vertical over them
at that hour. We cannot conceive of any
other sort of following of a fixed star. And
it was at Jerusalem, and only there or close
on that particular line of latitude at that par-
ticular time of the year, that this star was ver-
tical at exact midnight. This would also al-
low the required time for their journey after
the third conjunction.

The further item in the narrative, to the

THE FOLLOWING OF TILE STAR. 44 1

effect that " the star went before them till it
came and stood over where the young child
was," is explainable in the same way. The
short distance of some six miles between Je-
rusalem and Bethlehem would make so little
difference in the observation of a vertical star
that it would be impossible to note it without
special astronomical appliances. Hence, when
these followers of the star came to Jerusalem,
they had gone as near to the spot they were
searching for as their natural observation
could serve to bring them. Accordingly, the
record implies that there they somehow lost
the benefit of the star's leading, so that they
applied to Herod for further information.
Their light from the observance of the stars
being in this way exhausted, they would nat-
urally betake themselves to the reigning sov-
ereign there to learn the specific locality in
which this sublime Prince was born, being
assured by their starry guidance that it must
needs be somewhere in that immediate vicin-
ity. And having obtained answer that Beth-
lehem was the exact place indicated by sacred
prophecy, they set out for Bethlehem.

But on their way to Bethlehem, by some
means or other, to their great joy, their star
began to serve them again the same as it did

442 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

before. How this came about is explained by
a well-preserved and beautiful old tradition
which we have no reason to discredit.

Though Bethlehem is only about six miles
from Jerusalem, it is said that these distin-
guished visitors stopped on the way, and tar-
ried by the side of a deep well. What they
halted for in so short a journey it would be
hard to tell, except it was to take another
midnight observation of their star. For this
purpose the well, with its perpendicular walls,
would serve them the same as a fixed obser-
vatory. It was by means of such a well, and
the reflection of the sun in it, at Syene in
Egypt, that the line of the tropic was deter-
mined, and the extent of its declination in the
time that had elapsed since that well was dug.
So these wise men, by looking down the well,
and observing the reflection of their bright
star in the still water at the bottom, could
find with great accuracy whether it was ex-
actly vertical over them, or in what respect,
if any, it was not. And so the tradition is,
that they looked into the well and saw their
star, and perceived that it " stood over" — was
exactly vertical at — not Jerusalem, but Bethle-
hem, " where the young child was." Making
it designate the house is not in the record.

prophecy and astronomy. 443

Junction of Prophecy and Astronomy
The result of the acquisition of this new
light by means of their own star-guide tradi-
tion and the Scriptures both describe. They
both say that "when they saw the star" and
realized its relation to Bethlehem, " they re-
joiced with exceeding great joy." And well
they might, for it was a conjunction like that
of Jupiter and Saturn themselves — the per-
fect conjunction and coincidence of the pri-
meval astronomy and the revelations giv-
en by Israel's prophets touching the great
Messiah. These men, indeed, had not yet
reached the object of their search, but they
were now doubly sure of finding and seeing
the illustrious Virgin-born Saviour of the
world, of whom the heavens and all sacred
story had been telling and prophesying from
remotest antiquity, and in whom they felt
more interest than in all the earth besides.
It was the Eureka ! Eureka ! of Gentile faith
and hope on the threshold of embracing the
adorable infant Seed of the woman, of whose
glorious advent they had now no longer the
least shadow of a doubt. Nor need we be
surprised if it should turn out that this was
the very well of Bethlehem of which David

444 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

had such fond remembrance, and from whi^h
he so longed to drink.

And when we come to consider who these
"wise men" were, whence they came, and
what their character, position, relations, and
main occupations, our explanation of the case
is doubly strengthened.

Who the Magi were.

There has been about as much uncertainty,
debate, and diversity of opinion touching the
identity of these people as about the star of
which they spake. It would be a waste of
time to describe the wide-ranging imaginings
upon the subject. We only need to know
the solid facts in the case.

It is settled by Matthew's narrative that
these people on their mission of homage to
the infant Christ were Magi, and that they
came from a country far eastward from Pal-
estine. Whether from due east is not in
volved in the statement. According to all
the elements of the showing, and by the gen-
eral consent of the Church in all ages, they
were Gentiles — the first-fruits unto Christ
from the Gentile world. All classic writers,
from Herodotus down to Ammianus, agree
in pointing to Media as their hom^-country —

WHO THE MAGI WERE. 445

the country of the illustrious Cyrus, who is
noted in sacred prophecy and was announced
by inspiration as God's anointed for the de-
liverance of Israel from Babylon long before
he was born.

The Magi are specially named in the list
of the Median tribes, just as Matthew names
them. Anciently they were mostly a pastoral
people greatly occupied with religion, astron-
omy, and other sacred sciences. They were the
great teachers of kings and people in the di-
vine wisdom. They were a priestly or sacer-
dotal tribe, after the style of Levi among the
tribes of Israel. It was their hereditary priv-
ilege to provide their country with priests and
religious instructors. They were the minis-
ters and prophets of their day. Their relig-
ion was the noblest and the least corrupted
of all the ancient world. They lived mostly
in towns without walls, observing their own
laws and trusting to God alone for protec-
tion. It was from amone them that Zoroaster
sprung, if indeed such a man ever lived, and
that Confucius, more remotely perhaps, ob-
tained his better knowledge. It was from
among them that Cyrus selected his priests
for Persia. They believed in one God, orig-
inal Creator, supreme in omniscience and

38

446 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

goodness, unrivalled in splendor, and dwell-
ing in light eternal. They believed in a great
and powerful, spirit of evil in constant antag-
onism to God, the spoiler of the divine works
and the author of all mischief. The history
of the world to them was the history of the
conflict of the good originating with God and
the evil originating with the Devil. All men
they considered active in this conflict on the
one side or the other. They held that God
by His prophets gave a revelation and a law
by which men might know their duty, fashion
their hopes, and direct their conduct, and
which it was their business to preserve and
expound. They possessed both the Solar
and Lunar Zodiacs, and claimed that they
were given of God to teach man wisdom,
forecast the future, and give hope to the
good. According to the showings 0f the
constellations, they looked for a time when a
Son of the eternal Lawgiver would be born,
who should be a great Saviour and Deliverer,
by whom the spirit of evil and the powers of
hell would be destroyed, the dead raised up
to life again, and a kingdom of everlasting
life and happiness established over all the
earth.

So I find it written in the best accounts of

WHO THE MAGI WERE. 44/

them and in those fragments of their sacred
books which are still preserved and of late
years published in our tongue.

And, as before Abraham's time and outside
of his chosen family-line, there were men like
Job and his friends, like Melchisedec, king of
Salem, like Jethro, priest of Midian and father-
in-law of Moses, like Balaam before his fall —
men of faith in the traditional revelations that
came forth out of the ark — men whom the
Spirit of God and saving wisdom had not en-
tirely abandoned — so in the time of Christ's
birth there were some noble spirits among
the descendants of these ancient Magi who
still eagerly clung to the hope of the sure ful-
filment of the primeval promise, and hence con-
tinued to observe the heavens, and to consult
what they considered the inspired lore of the
skies, that they might not miss the signs and
tokens noted in the hereditary prophecies
of their caste as presages of the advent of
the great Virgin-born Son of the eternal
Sovereign.

And to men of such descent, culture, faith,
hope, office, and pursuits, what more would be
necessary than just the starry indications which
I have named to thrill their souls with pro-
foundest enthusiasm, fan the smouldering em-

448 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

bers of their hereditary knowledge into a flame
of intensest animation, and create just such
an expedition to greet the new-born divine
King, as that described in connection with the
text ? Had we been in their place, with their
beliefs, feelings, and anticipations, with such
signs and indications upon the face of the sky,
where we and our fathers were taueht to read
the sacred foreshowings of what was to come
to pass, I feel sure that we would have been
moved, rejoiced, thrilled, and impelled just as
they were.

And why, then, should we not accept the
.onclusion that so it was ? There is not a
particle of evidence on earth that this was not
the true state of the case as respects the Magi.
All the conditions and known facts and pre-
sumable likelihoods point in this one direc-
tion. Everything in the record thus explains
to the full as it will not explain in any other
way known to men. And the whole result in
this view takes on that dignity, importance,
and far-reaching instructiveness which best
befit its place in the New Testament. It is
a view which silences and sweeps away the
unworthy suspicions, perplexities, and cavils
which have so lon^ huncr about it in the minds
and estimates of many, clearing it up into def-

THE SUM OF THE WHOLE. 449

inite and comprehensible shape, and vindi-
cating die action of the Church in putting it
forward as the subject of a special festival,
the opening theme of a prominent season in
her calendar, and the keynote of the earthly
Epiphany of the sublime Redeemer of the
world.

The Sum. of the Whole.
Here, then, is a magnificent instance, ac-
credited by the Holy Ghost, which stands as
an everlasting testimony to the fact of a pri-
meval revelation to all men, to the existence
of a record of that revelation in the primeval
astronomy, and to the preservation of the
same in sufficient incorruptness to inform
those who clung to it of the time and place
of the nativity of the long-promised Seed
of the woman, and to move them to go and
greet Him in His cradle with their devoutest
homage and adoration. Surely, this ought to
be enough to put the matter beyond dispute,
and to settle for ever that there is such a
thing as the Gospel in the Stars — even that
very Gospel of God which holds forth Jesus
of Nazareth as the promised Seed of the wo-
man, the divine-human Son of the Virgin, who
was to come, to suffer, and to toil and die for

38 * 2D

450 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

the deliverance of man from darkness, sin
death, and the power of the Devil, to bruise
the head of the Serpent, to destroy the works
and dominion cf the great Enemy, and to
bring in everlasting redemption to our fallen
race. It was to Jesus of Nazareth, even in
His cradle, that the primeval astronomy con-
ducted these remote Gentile believers ; and
to that same Jesus, amid vivid and glowing
illustrations of the truth respecting His na-
ture, person, mission and work, past, present,
and future, the primeval astronomy is still
capable of conducting even Christians them-
selves.

To those who have entered into the induc-
tion of facts and showings which I have given,
though imperfectly, in these Lectures, I am
sure no further evidence is needed to work
conviction of the merit and worth of the sub-
ject, and of the evangelic illuminations which
it furnishes. We have considered these heav-
ens, and, behold, we have found them flaming
from end to end, from centre to circumfer-
ence, with that superlative " glory of God "
which shines " in the face of Jesus Christ."
We have taken our stand beneath the shining
archway, and looked at the grand procession
of the celestial scenery as inscribed by God's

THE SUM OF THE WHOLE. 45 T

primeval prophets, and have listened to the
story as it unfolded ; and, lo ! it is the same
blessed story of the fall and redemption —
of Jesus and "the restitution of all things" —
which we have in the writings of the Prophets
and Apostles. Our experience has been akin
to that of those on Jordan's banks, who saw
the heavens opened, and beheld the Spirit
alighting on the Virgin's Child, and heard a
voice from the depths of eternity saying,
" This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well
pleased!' On that great Virgin-born our
eyes were fixed from the very starting-point.
On Him our attention has been kept and
riveted at every step of the way through the
whole circuit of the skies, with the Ecliptic
and across it. And ever sharper, clearer,
gladder, and fuller grew the glorious testi-
mony as we advanced, till all the morning
stars seemed to resume their ancient songs
and all the sons of light their primeval shouts,
whilst these far-spanning heavens through all
their constellations rang out, " Hosannah !
Blessed is He that cometh in the Name of the
Lord! Hosannah in the highest!"

On such sublime heights, amid such scenes
of song and brightness, we would fain linger.
Like Peter on the mount, we would here build

452 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

tabernacles and abide. But, though to other
scenes and duties called, like him we still may
bear away with us the memory of what we
have witnessed, and think of it in our humble
toils and sad solitudes, and be all the firmer
in our faith and the more hopeful in our out-
look toward the nearing eternity. And happy
they, and wise indeed, to whom it is given
through these contemplations to say in truth
and soul-earnestness of Him to whom the
heavens thus testify, " We have seen His star,
and are come to worship Him!'

Thus, then, my long task is done. And
may the God of heaven and earth, who bring-
eth forth Mazzaroth in his seasons and guides
A returns with his sons, bless the humble con-
tribution to the confirmation of His Word, the
honor of His Name, and the vindication of the
claims of Jesus Christ to the undoubting faith
and everlasting adoration of all that live and
move beneath His genial skies !

Gloria in Excelsis Deo!

SUPPLEMENT.

NOTICES OF "THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS," CRITL
CISMS, REPLIES TO QUESTIONS AND OBJECTIONS
WITH FURTHER EXPLANATIONS, ARGUMENTS
AUTHORITIES, AND A GENERAL INDEX.

Notices.

The author of this book has no reason to com-
plain of a lack of notices of his work. The press
in general has referred to it, and a hundred or more
of such notices have come into his possession. Some
of these have been very sympathetic with the theme
and have much commended the argument.

Thus, Stoddarfs Review, among other favorable
expressions, says :

" He makes it apparent that the strange figures belonging to the
constellations were familiar at a period that antedates by thousands
of years any known religious faith which failed to recognize the
existence and power of the true God. The evidence is strong
which maintains that these devices had their origin in the very
earliest ages of the world ; and this one fact, proved as it seems to
be, may be accepted as excellent testimony to their divine origin ;
and if that origin was divine, then it is fair to attempt, as Dr. S.
does, to ascertain what was the purpose of their arrangement. If
the hand of the Creator appears in these signs, confessed through

453

454 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

all the centuries to be surrounded by mystery, and having a persist-
ent existence which cannot be accounted for by the action of purely
human agencies, then it is a fair inference that there is behind them
some wonderful and eternal purpose which man, in a just spirit of
reverence, may seek to detect."

Thus, The Prophetic Times says :

"The correspondence between the starry groups and the Sacred
Scriptures is traced with a vigorous pen, and invested with an
absorbing interest as vivid as it is novel ; and we rise from its
perusal with the conviction that there can be no question but that
the Gospel glows in these heavenly constellations with all the lustre
of the stars themselves. The most remarkable thing elicited by the
doctor's researches, and clearly exhibited in this book, is, that such
an array of symbolic figures, with the names of the principal stars
composing the groups, should admit of being interpreted by the facts
and truths of the Gospel; showing beyond cavil the divine origin
of both. We have often wondered what these abnormal figures of
astronomy could mean, and supposed they were of a piece with the
absurdities of heathen mythology; and our satisfaction is as great
as our surprise to find them so completely rescued from that abuse
and restored to what appears to have been their divinely-intended
service. And Dr. S. merits great praise for his indefatigable re-
search and consummate skill in penetrating and removing the veil
of mythology, and discovering to us in so masterly a manner their
true symbolic character and meaning."

Thus also the Christian Union says :

"The attempt to read the Gospel of Christ from the skies seems
absurd, but the boldness of Dr. Seiss has been rewarded with so
much of success as demands careful thought. With much skill the
author has explained the meaning of these heavenly emblems in the
light of the New-Testament revelations. The history of the past,
and the yet unfulfilled prophecies, are read in these strange figures
of the skies, and the studies of Dr. S. now made public surely
enrich the geography of the heavens and give new delight to the
devout soul. The book is an evidence of what the things of crea-
tion can be made to teach those who are in sympathy with the great

NOTICES. 455

plan of redemption, and what yet may be unfolded of the wisdom
and power of God when the unity of all His works is fully known."

Likewise, the Boston Newsdealers' Bulletin says :

"This volume displays to view the absurdity of the theories of
skeptics, explains the origin and meaning of the constellations of
the heavens, and shows what bearing they have upon the Christian
religion and the sustaining of the truths set forth in the Word of
God. He sees much in the myths of primeval history, and proves
irrevocably that Jesus is the divine and appointed Saviour."

The Messenger of the Reformed Church says :

" We have been very much pleased with the book. It is possible
that an occasional citation from the Scriptures may seem to be a
little far-fetched, but there is more truth in the general assertions
than most people wot of."

The New England Journal of Education says :

" The whole subject is fresh, new, and thoroughly handled, and
the same is presented in popular form, which the plainest under-
standing can easily follow, whether familiar with astronomy or not.
To readers in general, and particularly to those interested in Reve-
lation, the evidence of inspiration, and the proofs that Jesus is the
divine and appointed Saviour of the World, this book cannot fail to
be of intense interest."

The Lutheran Church Review says :

" The conclusions reached, while from their novelty often causing
the reader to plead surprise and to ask a stay of judgment, seem so '
fairly reached that the conviction grows upon the mind that if they
are to be refuted, it can be done only by showing that the facts pre-
mised are no facts at all. The writer of this notice has no intention
to undertake a task of that sort."

The Fort Wayne Gazette says :

" The argument which the author makes is not a flimsy one, by
any means. The inferences drawn from the facts represented are

45 6 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

quite satisfactory, and cannot be brushed away as being mere trifles.
It is a work of more than a passing interest. It affords subject for
thought and reflection, and will have a wide circulation."

Even in the majority of instances in which the
writers have expressed a reserve as to the theory of
the book there has been a hearty commendation of
it as worthy of particular consideration, as containing
much important astronomical, historical, and theo-
logical material, as tending to interest and edify, in
the direction of sound faith, and as opening up a
subject of legitimate inquiry, the study of which may
result in conclusions of solid worth in the interpre-
tation of much that is not understood or greatly mis-
understood.

Thus The Guardian says :

" This work is well worth reading. It opens up a general subject
which is more and more attracting attention, especially since the late
discoveries of Modern Science in the field of Ancient Ethnography.

" Traditional accounts of the Creation, and of the great facts in
the history of Man, were treasured up, not only in the Books of
Moses, but in those inscriptions engraved by the immediate descend-
ants of Noah which have recently been brought to light, and which
have of late years been deciphered.

"Nor are such historical memorials of those great events con-
fined to the tablets found in the ruins of Bablyon and Nineveh alone.
Indeed, it is contended that such traditions have been handed down
in symbols of various kinds found in Egypt, Asia, Mexico, Central
America, and Peru. And such a scholar as Humboldt is cited as
bearing witness to the wonderful analogy existing in these symbolic
mysteries.

" In such explanations of the signs of the Zodiac [and other
ancient constellations] Dr. S. does not claim originality; and he
makes use of an amount of literary contributions to the subject, of
which little is generally known. He makes one good point against
modern Infidelity.

notices. 457

" To all those who believe that the Lamb of God was < slain
from the foundation of the world' (Rev. 13:8) Dr. Seiss's interpre-
tation of the signs of the Zodiac will have its interest, however little
reliance they may place upon his theory."

The Printer's Circular says :

" A strong, plausible case is made out by the learned author, who
exhausts vast stores of erudition to establish and prove his novel
position. Those who do not agree with him must at least concede
him the possession of far more astronomical lore than is usually
possessed by doctors of divinity. The book is sure to be welcomed
as a permanent addition to the world's stock of speculative the-
ology."

So the Utica Herald :

" While it is easy to say that the theory put forth in this book is
full^of imagination, and seems wholly fanciful and far-fetched, no
one can say that as interpretations of the constellations these anal-
ogies are not quite as reasonable and far more dignified than many
of the myths with which they are now associated."

So the Indianapolis Republican :

" The author has done good work in this book, and his study
of the subject shows through every sentence. He has crowded a
world of useful and curious information into a handy volume, and
connects the olden myths with the Gospel of Jesus Christ in a
manner as clear as it is new to many. The book is a valuable
acquisition, and cannot but be of interest to all."

So also the Chicago Standard :

" It will not do to dismiss without reflection the theory presented
by the writer, however fanciful it may at first seem. That God wrote
the story of the Cross in the constellations of the heavens we may
not be ready to accept as truth, but, whether we reject this hypoth-
esis or not, we can hardly escape the feeling that there are facts
involved in the science of Astronomy which require a reasonable
explanation on Christian grounds. How came the manifold resem-
39

45 8 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

blances betwixt the Gospel story and the intimations both of myth-
ology and astrology ? Dr. Seiss's theory is at least worthy of con-
sideration, and, while personally we should not adopt it, still we
admire the carefulness and thoroughness of the discussion before us,
and for its stimulus and suggestion heartily recommend it to our
readers. The spirit of the work is thoroughly devout, and, as is
manifest, evangelical."

The Presbyterian says : " The book is certainly one
of interest, whatever may be thought of the theory;"
and so many other writers of Book Notices in papers
of various classes.

Criticisms.

The adverse notices of this book have mainly
come from three classes of minds. The first class
consists of those who have no idea of a personal
God, treat all religion as superstition, reject inspi-
ration in the sense of divine revelation, and see
no need of an atoning Redeemer. A reviewer
expresses the belief that " one of the uses of this
book possibly will be to tend to destroy much of
the force of that kind of infidelity which pretends
to find all the germs of Christianity in precedent
religions and mythologies." The author has learned
of an instance in which the consideration of these
presentations was the means of reclaiming a pro-
nounced infidel to faith in the Gospel. The book,
therefore, is very much in conflict with infidelity,
and has done anything but please skeptics and those
skeptically inclined.

The second class consists of professed Christians,

CRITICISMS. 459

of the so-called liberal and rationalistic school, the
bent of whose philosophy is to contemplate man
as a creature of cultivation from a troglodite or
savage, and destined to rise by self-development,
perhaps with a little adventitious aid, into ultimate
perfection, and who are accordingly very devoted
to what they are pleased to call Progress. The
whole showing and doctrine of this book is much
of a stumbling-block in the way of such thinking,
and hence, to minds of this class, it is " wild,"
" imaginary," " a fanciful endeavor to make a pro-
phetic purpose out of the names (?) of the constel-
lations," " absurd."

The third class consists of certain self-complacent
believers, jealous of everything that happens to go
beyond the range of their treadmill paths. These
are stirred with pious alarm at any attempt to show
that the same prophetic Word of God may possibly
have another record of its glorious contents in an-
other place and form from the Bible. They cannot
favor this book, lest they should encourage a style
of reasoning that may bring discredit on the very
cause it seeks to advocate.

A striking example of such cowardly trembling
for the Ark of the Lord is presented in one who
deploringly says, " The purpose is so praiseworthy,
and the zeal and eloquence brought to bear upon
it are so great, that some will doubtless be carried
.away by the reasoning of the author to a conviction
that the heavenly constellations are indeed a pre-
vious revelation of vital importance"!

460 THE GOSPEL /AT THE STARS.

There is, of course, but one Revelation, one
Christ, one Gospel, one plan and purpose of Re-
demption for fallen man, even that which is written
in the Old and New Testaments ; but why may it
not be given in a thousand different modes of pres-
entation, to as many prophets, in different ages,
symbolically here and didactically there, in high
poetry or in simple parable? And where is the
harm or loss to sacred truth, the calamity to souls,
the disadvantage to faith, if it should appear that
God verily caused His glorious Gospel to be pic-
torially inscribed on the everlasting stars from the
beginning, as well as afterward written in divers
forms and languages on perishable parchment?
The early world certainly had a revelation of Gos-
pel truth, whether they hung it on the stars or
not.

Of course, nothing contrary to the written Word
is to be admitted as matter of faith, whether from
the pictures in the starry heavens or from any
other source. We cannot so much as know that
these pictures set forth the Gospel, except as they
accord with the written Word. But when men
deny the inspiration of the written record, and
seek to empty it of its sublimest substance by their
miserable rationalizing, it is a transcendent gain
and advantage, in which every genuine believer
should rejoice with thankfulness, to be able to
point to a duplicate record of precisely the same
glorious things, in quite another form, and in place
and time where nothing but the special inspiration

NO CHAMPION. 461

and illumination of God could have produced it.
Whether we really have such an earlier duplicate
of the grand substance of the Gospel in the pri-
meval astronomy can only be decided on the evi-
dences in the case ; but it is a super-devotion and
a very stupid pietism to deplore the finding of
grounds for such a conviction.

No Champion for Current Theories.
A noteworthy fact with regard to the adverse
notices of this book is, that not one of the writers
has ventured in any degree to champion or defend
the current theories respecting the origin and
meaning of the constellations. Those who have
had the field and the sway hitherto when put on
trial have nothing to say. They thus show that
they secretly feel they have no case against the
showings of this book. They are in the unpleas-
ant plight of having sanctioned a line of thinking
which they are at a loss to maintain, and of being
confronted with a great, heaven-wide, universal
system, as old as the oldest records of the race,
and handled every day by all peoples on earth,
which they are not at all able rationally, historical-
ly, or scientifically to explain ; whilst their former
thinking is assailed and pressed with a new method
of contemplation so reasonable, so dignified, so
true to the worthiest records and traditions, so
consistent, harmonious, and exhaustive in its ex-
planations of all the multitudinous facts entering
into the case, that they do not know where or

39*

462 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

how to attack it, or how to dispose of it without
a radical revolution in their wavs of looking- at
things, to which they are by no means willing to
submit.

One writer so feels this embarrassment that he
has sought a way out by declaiming against " taking
the ignorance of everybody as a basis of know-
ledge." But that will not help him. This book
does not assert that the constellations are inspired
prophetic symbols of the promised redemption by
" the Seed of the woman," because nobody can
tell whence else or for what else they came into
being. The whole field is diligently surveyed.
The entire system as originally constituted is
searched out and exhibited. The principal myths
connected with each constellation, as well as the
figures which mark them, both in themselves and
in relation to one another, are carefully analyzed.
The names of the chief stars belonging to each
group are sought out and interpreted by the light
of the best linguistic guides. The whole is closely
compared, section by section, with the statements,
imagery, and diction of the Holy Scriptures touch-
ing the Author and Work of human redemption.
A clear and complete correspondence — as clear and
complete as that between the parables of Christ
and the spiritual truths they were meant to illustrate
— is traced out in detail. A vast body of historical,
scriptural, traditional, and mythical facts is presented,
which not only accord with the theory, but largely
demand it as the only right conclusion from them.

THE SOUTHERN CROSS. 463

And there is thus fairly made out a full, legitimate,
and independent case, which must, in all just logic,
go through, unless the facts on which it rests can
be solidly refuted or some equally adequate and
verifiable explanation of them can be given. Not
on men's ignorance is the doctrine of this book
built, but on evidences which demand to be handled
as all other testimony when in honest search for the
truth. Nevertheless, when people avow ignorance
and inability to make any showing to the contrary,
their sneers and jeers are to their own discredit
and shame, and their plea against the presentation
is itself a 'disqualification for the giving of any
judgment in the matter.

The Southern Cross.

But the writer last referred to makes one point
of legitimate attack which, if it could be main-
tained, would be of some weight against the pres-
entations of this book. The following is the state-
ment in full in which this point is made :

" Dr. Seiss is not consistent with himself. His
theory requires him to stick to the ancient signs.
It is only those that issue from the deep antiquity
back of the Theban Tables, about which our ignor-
ance is vast enough, to give room to unfold the
wings of his spacious argument. The unknown-
prophet theory will not work for constellations whose
recent origin discloses the fact that there was no
prophet of any kind in the case. The Southern
Cross is one of these. The stars that form it are

464 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

in the heavens, but there is nothing said about the
constellation in Ptolemy or in the Theban Tables.
But it is too inviting a constellation for Dr. S. to
resist the temptation to use it. Accordingly, he
shifts his ground from the map to the heavens, lets
the unknown astronomer prophet who impressed the
eternal record on the Zodiac go, and proceeds to
interpolate the Southern Cross into the record on
its own merits." — N. Y. Independent, Sept. 7, 1882.

The author of the above extract also wrote and
published an attack on The Gospel in the Stars some
months before it was in print — before he had seen a
line of it except the statement on the publisher's
prospectus. This is mentioned to show with what
sincerity and earnestness he is concerned to get at
and set forth the truth on this subject. Still, if he
finds a fair objection, it is due that it should have a
fair hearing and be fairly met.

Now, it is true that the constellation of the South-
ern Cross is designated and used in this book (pp.
98-104) as the first Decan of Libra, just as the
Northern Crown is given as the third Decan of the
same sign ; but it is not true that either the one or
the other, or any constellation used in this attempted
reading of the stars, belongs to those fabrications of
conceit, flattery, and self-will which, in more recent
times, have been thrust into the celestial charts.

It is also true that the Southern Cross, as a
separate constellation, does not appear in the list
of Hipparchus repeated in the Almagest of Ptolemy,
and that it came for the first time into modern atlases

THE SOUTHERN CROSS. 465

in Royer's Celestial Chart, published in 1679, whence
it has been erroneously ascribed to him as his own
invention. These facts had not been overlooked,
and it is a very superficial acquaintance with the
history of the matter which would take them as
proving this constellation one of tnose which have
been obtruded into the celestial maps in modern
times.

The reason why it does not appear in the list of
Hipparchus and Ptolemy is obvious. That list was
intended to give only what was verified by practical
observation, and none of the constellations are in-
cluded but such as the makers of it could see and
identify in the heavens. But the Southern Cross
in their day had sunk by the precession of the
equinox so far into the south as to be scarcely
visible any more from the latitudes in which their
observations were made. Some of the stars of the
Southern Cross are embraced in the list, as they
could then be seen hanging low down on the
southern horizon ; but the constellation, as such,
was invisible, and so its higher stars, which could
be seen, were assigned to the constellation Centau-
ries, immediately over the Southern Cross, while the
Southern Crown was put in to fill out the tradi-
tional number in place of the Cross, which these
observers could not find.

It is plain, however, that the Southern Crown —
Corona Australis — was not one of the great old
original forty-eight signs. It is far inferior to any
one of them, having no star above the fifth magni-

2 E

466 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

tude, and no meaning anywhere to be discovered.
It is totally destitute of all mythological place,
history, or tradition. It is situated near where the
Southern Cross was expected to be, and because
that could not be found and identified, this seeming
Crown was substituted for it, and the Cross dropped
out as mythic and having no real existence. None
of the authorities on the primeval constellations
mention it, and Aspin says it is an invention of
the later times.

Ptolemy himself also confesses that in the tables
and charts presented by him liberties were taken
to change figures and the places of stars in them.
He says :

" Multis ego in locus accommodatiora ipsis figu-
ris attribuentes vocabula, priscorum usum immu-
tavimus, sicut, verbi gratia, figuras quas Hipparchus
in humeris Virginis locat, nos in costis ejus sitas
esse dicimus, quoniam distantia earum ad Stellas
quae in capite sunt major apparet, quam ad eas quae
in extrematibus manuum collocantur, hoc autem
sicut et costis accomodatur."

Two things appear from this statement. The
one is that, for aesthetic reasons, changes were made
in the figures, etc. of the constellations, and hence
that we are not to look to these charts as faithfully
presenting in full all the old forms of the astro-
nomical signs. The other is of still more conse-
quence touching the point in question, and that is,
the clear and distinct acknowledgment that neither
he nor Hipparchus were the inventors of these

THE CROSS AN aNCIENT SIGN. 467

signs, and that a system of them, covering the
whole visible heavens, existed, and was held to be
of unquestioned authority, unknown origin, and
unsearchable antiquity in his day. Whether, there-
fore, the Southern Cross belongs to the ancient
forty-eight constellations or not cannot be deter-
mined from its absence from the Ptolemaic tables,
as that can argue nothing for or against the asser-
tion that it does so belong, apart from other show-
ings.

The Cross one of the Ancient Signs.
Other and more decisive showings, however, are
not wanting. Ulugh Beigh, about two centuries
before Royer, Aben Ezra, about four centuries be-
fore Royer, and Albumazer, about eight centuries
before Royer, all three give this south polar con-
stellation as named and designated in the most
ancient astronomy as one of the Decans of Libra.
Albumazer and Aben Ezra give it with the accom-
panying statement that, according to the old tradi-
tions and accounts, it was in the form of a cross.
They likewise give its name as Adorn, which means
cutting off, the boundary, the lowest limit, as the last
letter of the old Oriental alphabets was tan, and
always written in the form of the cross. Ulugh
Beigh also gives its name in the old Coptic, where
he says it was called Sera, which Birch says means
victory, triumph by a great conflict. All this quite
agrees with the death of " the Seed of the woman "
on the cross.

468 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Unlike Hipparchus and Ptolemy, these men were
not giving the constellations as then to be seen and
identified on the heavens, but as handed down in
the most ancient astronomical traditions. If they
had been describing from their own observations,
they would also have had to omit the Southern
Cross from their charts, for it was not visible in
their days in their latitudes, and will not be again
for thousands of years, until it comes around to its
ancient place by the completion of the precessional
cycle. They spoke from the ancient records and
traditions, which it was their aim to present, and
they all claim to give faithfully and truly what had
thus been transmitted from the earliest times. Chris-
tians they were not, neither had they any liking for
Christianity, and there is nothing whatever to induce
suspicion that they did not report the facts as they
found them.

These authorities ought to be sufficient upon the
point ; but it is not all to indicate that the constel-
lation of the Southern Cross has come down " from
the deep antiquity back of the Theban Tables."

Calculating back on the precessional cycle for the
position of this sign in the period when these signs
were invented, we find that it was then conspicuous-
ly visible in all the north temperate zone at a con-
siderable elevation, rendering it nearly as conspicuous
as Orion now. It is made up of four of the most
brilliant stars in the south polar heavens. Another
so lustrous a group is not to be found in all that
field of sky. The pre-eminent glory and remark-

THE CROSS AN Ah CTENT SIGN. 4^9

able lustre of this group, as then visible from the
banks of the Euphrates and that region, put it out
of the question that it could or would have been
overlooked or left out in the making up of any
complete system, intended for any purpose, em-
bracing all the most illustrious stars then and
there visible. And yet it must have been thus
overlooked and left out if we are to discredit the
clear traditional record of its having been one of
the original forty-eight constellations.

Standing as it then did at about sixteen degrees
above the horizon at meridian, it gradually sunk
toward the south pole, until its highest star was
last visible in the latitude of Jerusalem about the
time the Saviour reached the lowest limit of His
passion and yielded up His life upon the cross.
It cannot be seen now except in latitudes far down
to the southward.

When Americus Vespucius was on his southern
voyages, more than a hundred years before Royer's
chart was made, and his eyes beheld the brilliant
stars of the Southern Cross, he congratulated him-
self on having rediscovered what had been for so
many ages lost except to mythic fable, and boasted
of having seen what had not been seen by civilized
man till then except by the first of the human race.
He it was who pointed cut in Dante's Purgatorio
that remarkable passage, which he claimed to be
a description of the Southern Cross :

" To the right I turned, and fixed my mind
On the other pole attentive, when I saw
40

47° THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Four stars ne'er seen before save by the ken
Of our first parents. Heaven ol their rays
Seemed joyous. O thou northern site ! bereft
Indeed, and widowed, since of these deprived !"

Gary's Dante, Purg., canto i.

Ventura wonders at this description, particularly
as the Southern Cross, to which the words and al-
lusions so admirably fit, had not yet been rediscov-
ered in Dante's time. But Cary very properly sug-
gests that "from long tradition the real truth might
not have been unknown to our poet;" and adds
that M. Artaud mentions a globe constructed by
an Arabian in Egypt, with the date of the year 622
of the Hegira (corresponding to 1225 of our era),
in which the Southern Cross is positively marked"
Von Humboldt thinks he also saw this constella-
tion on Arabian globes. It certainly was not trans-
ferred from Royer's chart to these globes, though
Royer may have incorporated it from some Orien-
tal source or tradition, confirmed as it had become
in his day by various navigators and travellers who
had looked upon it and found it to be a reality and
not a mere myth.

Dupuis also gives it as an ancient tradition that
this south polar constellation was lost, and that
whensoever it would again be found it would be
found to be in the form of a cross.

Albumazer, in his enumeration of the Decans,
including the Southern Cross, says, " They were
known all over the world," and considered of sa-
cred prophetic significance.

THE CROSS AN ANCIENT SIGN. \J\

Humboldt refers to the fact that the ancient
Persians celebrated a feast of the cross a few days
.before the sun entered Aries, which was the time
of year when the Southern Cross was highest and
most brilliant in their skies. He also speaks of the
modern Persians, Kaswini, and Mohammedan as-
tronomers as searching for crosses in the signs of
the Dolphin and the Dragon (the Southern Cross
having disappeared below the southern horizon), in
order to account for this ancient sacred festival
Restore that constellation to its ancient position
and all is adequately explained, as well as the
uses made of the sign of the cross and its asso-
ciations and significations in the mythologies of
ancient Egypt, India, Mexico, and of other primi
tive peoples.

According to Albumazer, the Persians called this
Decan of Libra by the name of Arbedi, which car-
ries with it the sense of covering, and so would
wonderfully well coincide with the purpose of the
death upon the cross accomplished in the fulness
of time by the Virgin-born Redeemer predicted
and promised from the foundation of the world.

From all this it is made amply evident that the
author of this book does not at all " shift his
ground " when taking in the Southern Cross as
part of the grand evangelic record inscribed upon
the heavens, and that he does not " interpolate " the
primeval constellations, but gives them in their un-
mutilated intergrity, when he gives the Southern
Cross as one of them.

472 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Dr. Seyffarth.

One writer speaks disparagingly of the author
of this book for " taking Seyffarth as his guide in
Egyptology." The assertion, however, has not
the slightest foundation in fact. Dr. SeyfTarth's
astronomically-founded opinion on the age of the
Zodiac (p. 59), and his curious presentation of the
astronomical reference in the placement and order
of the letters in the alphabet (p. 63), are referred
to, but these particulars are no essential part of the
argument. They are only coincident with it. Dr.
SeyfTarth is not the basis or " guide " for any
Egyptological facts or doctrines cited, or for any-
thing else vitally entering into the presentations
of this book, although he is no mean authority in
matters of archaeological science and astronomical
calculations. He has done more solid work per-
haps than three-fourths of the men of whom more
general notice is taken. Here is an extract from
the London Times (Dec. 31, 1859) which may
serve to show that he is no fool in these things :

" Professor Mitchell in his lectures on astronomy
said that not long since he had met in the city of
St. Louis, in Missouri, a man of great scientific at-
tainments who for forty years had been engaged
in Egypt deciphering the hieroglyphics of the an-
cients. This gentleman stated to him that he had
lately unravelled the inscriptions on the coffin of a
mummy now in the British Museum, and that by
the aid of previous observation he had discovered

LANGUAGE AND WRITING. 473

the key to all the astronomical knowledge of the
Egyptians. The Zodiac, with the exact position
of the planets, was delineated on the coffin, and the
date to which they pointed was the autumnal equi
nox in the year b. c. 1722, or nearly four thousand
years ago. Professor Mitchell employed his assist-
ants to ascertain the exact position of the heavenly
bodies belonging to our solar system on the equinox
of that year, 1722 b. c, without having communicated
his object in so doing; the calculations were made,
and, to his astonishment, on comparing the work
with the statements of his friend already referred
to, it was found that on the 7th of October, 1722
b. c, the moon and planets had occupied the exact
positions in the heavens marked upon the coffin in
the British Museum."

This gentleman, so tested and complimented by
Professor Mitchell, was none other than G. Seyffarth,
Ph. D., D. D., quoted in this book, and so unwar-
rantably sneered at by the Boston Literary World.

The Origin of Language and Writing.
Another writer argues that the author of this
book is quite innocent of " recent researches in
philology and palaeontology," and shows " a very
primitive faith " in coolly asserting that language
and writing are as old as the human family. It is
hard to tell what this assailant means, unless he be
a believer in what Carlyle calls " the Gospel of
dirt," which considers man a sort of natural evolu-
tion from slime and slimy things through all stages

474 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

of reptihan, animal, and savage life in successive
unknown and unknowable ages. If so, the great
difference between him and this book is, that it
appeals to positive facts, records, and memorials
(see Lect. xvL, on, " Primeval Man "), whilst he
rests on a conceit of agnosticism which has not
one positive fact to which to appeal that can at all
be admitted as legitimate proof of what he avers
and accepts.

The Bible and all records and traditions of primi-
tive man attest the beginning of our race with Adam,
and show that he was the most divinely favored and
the most perfect, intelligent, and divine man that
ever did live, save the second Adam, the glorious
" Seed of the woman," the great Redeemer of
the world.

There is evidence that Adam spoke and wa^
spoken to, and that things he said and that were
said to him were preserved and made matters of
transmission to subsequent generations. Then cer-
tainly there was language from the beg-innine —
language fixed and comprehensible to others be-
sides himself, the same as language now. To deny
this is to contradict the whole record. He did not
learn this language from parents or contemporaries,
for they did not exist. It necessarily was the gift
of God, immediate and direct. Fix it as we will,
it was a miracle, the same as his own being. And
if God gave Adam the use of spoken language, it
was a mere fraction of the wonderful endowment
to give also the idea and means of writing what

LANGUAGE AND WRITING. 47$

he could speak and so well understood. The very
supernatural enlightenment which gave him the
intelligent use of language was itself sufficient to
suggest to him the writing of it and the making
of records of it — the representation of it to the eye
as well as to the ear.

We know that Adam called things by names,
and those names described the true nature and
qualities of the things to which they were applied.
What he called them they were and were called.
Here was at once the highest science, and the fixed
linguistic embodiment of that science. The heaven-
ly bodies came before him the same as creatures and
objects on the earth. He must therefore have named
them also, and named them as truly as he named
ether things. Something of astronomy would thus
necessarily be born of him. And the evidence now
amounts next thing to demonstration that the Zo-
diac, the constellations, and the naming and designa-
tions of the principal objects displayed in the heav-
ens date back to Adam's time. In this we have re-
corded pictorial and vocable language, and connect-
ed with a perfection of astronomic science which
remains as the true and indestructible basis of all
that we possess in that department even to this
present. How, then, can it be questioned that
both language and writing existed in Adam's
time ?

All " the recent researches in philology and pa-
laeontology " go to confirm the Bible doctrine on
this subject; and that doctrine, as old John W'eemes

476 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

has drawn it out (in the second part of his Christian
Synagogue, 1633), is, that "God made Adam to have
perfect knowledge, both of God and His creatures ;"
" Man in his first estate had the first principles
created in him of all sciences and liberal arts,
whereby he might understand the nature of the
creatures here below, and so learn by them. As
he was the father of all living, so he was the father
of all science ; for as he was able to beget children,
so he was able to teach his posterity ;" " He had
the knowledge of all things that might be known ;"
"Adam knew as much as was in the creatures ;"
" Man in his innocent estate excelled all that ever
were in the knowledge of natural things ;" " He
had the knowledge of all the liberal sciences ;"
"Adam knew all arts and sciences ; therefore Phil-
osophy is not an invention of the heathen, for it
came first from Adam to the Patriarchs, and so hath
continued still " (pp. 91-96).

All this necessarily involved the use of language
— how to speak it, how to embody thought in it,
how to represent it to the eye as well as to the
ear, and hence how to make records of it. We
know positively, from the inscriptions on stones,
tiles, cylinders, and seals recently exhumed in Chal-
dea and Assyria, that alphabetic writing, engraving,
and the preservation of knowledge in phonetic signs
not only existed, but were in a high state of cul-
tivation and common use, full two thousand years
before Christ, and date back close to, if not within,
the lifetime of Noah. Some of these exhumations

LANGUAGE AND WRITING. 477

are parts of dictionaries, grammars, and presenta-
tions with regard to the science of language, as
well as accounts of the Creation, of the facts in
the earliest history of the race, of the Zodiac and
its accompanying circles of other constellations, of
the Flood and the Babel disaster, of the forms of
agreement and contract respecting lands and chat-
tels, and the recording of them as well as elaborate
poems. And with this demonstration before our
eyes, and these records in tangible and readable
form in our possession from such indisputable an-
tiquity, there is no escape from the conclusion that
alphabetic writing dates back to the lifetime of
Noah, and that, existing and employed in his
day, it must have come with him from the other
side of the Flood. Noah lived and conversed with
Methuselah, and Methuselah lived and conversed
with Adam ; so that there was but one lifetime
between Noah and Adam. And if Noah used al-
phabetic writing, as we may be sure he did, then
there is every reason to believe that he brought
it from the time of Methuselah, who lived before
the death of Adam, from whom all the race has
most likely received it, as he, through his pre-emi-
nent illumination, from God.

The learned George Stanley Faber, in the second
volume of his Origin of Pagan Idolatry, devotes a
chapter (v.) to the many, widespread, and almost
universal early traditions of certain sacred books
and writings made by the antediluvian Patriarchs,
and one way and another preserved during the

478 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Flood for the instruction of the descendants of
those elected to survive it. He thinks these tradi-
tions certainly traceable to a period anterior to the
building of the Tower of Babel, and that they attest
a common belief at that time in the existence of
writings as old as, or even older than, the Deluge —
a belief which could hardly have found entrance
into men's minds if there had been no basis of
truth at the bottom of it. There must have been
writing then, or there could have been no thought
of writing done before the Flood ; and if there was
writing then, there is every reason to conclude that
there was writing from the beginning, and that it
came to the first man from God among the rest
of his equipments for the commencement of a high,
civilized, and perfect human society and life.

And with all this before us we ought to be pre-
pared to have some respect to Dr. Seyffarth's sum-
mation of the results of modern archaeological in-
vestigations when he says : " It is currently main-
tained that our alphabet was not invented until 1 500
b. c. by the Phoenicians ; now, it has been clearly
proved that there have existed an alphabet and books
since the time of Seth, more that a thousand years be-
fore the Deluge ; that all the alphabets in the world
had their origin from one and the same primitive
alphabet ; that our alphabet was transmitted through
Noah, and so arranged as to express the places of
the seven planets in the Zodiac at the termination
of the Deluge. — According to a venr generally
received opinion, the hieroglyphics of the Egyp-

LANGUAGE AND WRITING. 479

tians or the cuneiform characters of the Persians,
Medes, and Assyrians were the first of all written
characters ; now it is ascertained that all these and
similar written characters have the Noachian alpha-
bet of twenty-five letters for their basis. — Hitherto
a great number of Indo-maniacs have maintained
that the original language had been the Indo-Ger-
manic, a sort of Sanskrit ; now it is known that all
the languages in the world are derived from the
old Hebrew original language, as the very names
of the antediluvian letters among the different na-
tions, and the language of the ancient Egyptians,
prove. — According to Letronne and others, our Zo-
diac had its origin only five hundred years before
Christ; now we know that it is as old as the human
iace} and that it passed through Noah to all the
nations of his posterity. — Hitherto it has been sup-
posed that the earliest and innumerable astronomi-
cal observations of the ancient Egyptians, referred
to already by Diodorus Siculus, had utterly disap-
peared from the sphere of human knowledge ; now
we know that several hundreds of them, extending
down to the Roman emperors and back to Menes,
2781 b. c, have been preserved upon the Pyramids,
in temples, on sarcophagi, stellae, and papyrus-
scrolls." (See his Summary of Recent Discoveries,
New York, 1857.)

It may also be added, in passing, that an enor-
mous ship, greater than the Great Eastern, was
built before the Flood. It was one hundred and
twenty years in building. It served to weather the

480 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

turbulence of an ocean world. But how was it
possible practically to carry out the work of con-
structing such a vessel without the use of a fixed
system of measures, or without the use of figures,
drawings, and an established and comprehensible
order of notations which the workmen could read
and refer to ? Will those who deny the existence
of writing before the Flood give the solution of the
problem ? The successful building of such a struc-
ture is itself a demonstration that Noah could write
and that the antediluvians could read.

Science and the Constellations.

The question has been put : " If this theory be
true, how is it that the inspiration does not fit in
with the Copernican centre instead of the Ptole-
maic ?" It has also been objected that " the in-
disputable facts of science are obstacles to such a
belief as that of Dr. S. — obstacles which he has
scarcely made an attempt to overcome, and to which
he is very likely indifferent."

It may be laid down as an ethical axiom that no
man has the right to be indifferent to " indisputable
facts," whether of science, religion, or the common
affairs of life. Nor is the author of this book in-
different to any " facts of science " having in them
the element of settled truth. But no such facts
are known to him to impose a bar to the acceptance
of his explanation of the origin and meaning of the
ancient constellations, or to negative the astronomy
on which they are based. Any objection to be

SCIENCE AND THE CONSTELLATIONS. 48 1

raised on the ground here indicated can be raised
with equal force against the Scriptures and against
the popular almanacs which modern science itself
puts forth for the use of mankind, and which are
accepted on all hands. The astronomy of the an-
cient constellations is all embraced in the astronomy
of to-day, and belongs to the fixed verities of that
noble science. There is nothing in the astronomy
of the primitive constellations at variance with the
truths of the so-called Copernican system, or else
it would be impossible for the Copernicans of to-
day to accept and embody it in their science, as
they all do. Neither is there anything in this
primitive record to identify it with the elaborate
and exploded errors of the Ptolemaic system, or
any other which failed to accept the present doc-
trine of centres of gravitation and that the earth
and planets revolve around our sun. And if it notes
the sun as one of the exalted travellers that seem to
move across the face of the sky, and to connect no-
tations with these apparent motions, it is in full
accord with universal observation, with all the al-
manacs, with the diction of the Bible, and with the
ordinary statements of astronomers themselves. We
all accept the same in our common language every
day. Although we know the scientific facts, that
does not alter the appearances to the eye or our
way of speaking, or furnish a basis for any better
popular representation. Only for the sake of the
manifestation to the eye of the beholder' is the sun
thus numbered with the other travellers in the pic-
41 2 F

4^2 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

torial readings attached to the heavenly orbs. And
it is the only way, indeed, in which the sun can be
used for such a purpose, no matter what the scien-
tific facts may be.

Neither does such a notation of the apparent
motions of the sun to an earthly beholder argue
ignorance of the real astronomical truth. It is a
great error to suppose that no true knowledge of
the real structure of the solar system or of the
universe existed before the time of Pythagoras,
Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, and Newton. On this
point hear the testimony of Sir William Drum-
mond.

"T/ie fact is certain" says he, "that at some re-
mote period there were mathematicians and astron-
omers who knew that the sun is in the centre of our
system, and that the earth, itself a planet, revolves
•around the central fire; who attempted to calculate
the return of comets ; who indicated the number
of solar years contained in the great cycle by
multiplying a period (variously called in the Zend,
the Sanskrit, and the Chinese, Ven, Van, and Phen)
of one hundred and thirty years by another of
one hundred and forty years ; who took the paral-
lax of the sun by a method superior to that of
Hipparchus, and little inferior to our own; -who
fixed with considerable accuracy the distance ol
the moon and the circumference of the earth ; who
held that the face of the moon was diversified with
vales and mountains ; who asserted that there was
a planet beyond Saturn ; who reckoned the planets

SCIENCE AND THE CONSTELLATIONS. 483

to be sixteen in number ; and who calculated the
length of the tropical year within three minutes of
the true time. All the authorities for these asser-
tions are stated in my Essay on the Science of the
Egyptians and CJialdeans,

" There is nothing, then, improbable in the report
of Josephus when he says that the descendants of
Seth were skilful astronomers, and seems to ascribe
to them the invention of the cycle of which Cassini
has developed the excellence. The Jews, Assyrians,
and Arabians have abundance of traditions concern-
ing the antediluvian astronomical knowledge, espe-
cially of Adam, Seth, Enoch, and Ham. It was
asserted in the book of Enoch, as Origen tells us,
that the constellations in the time of that patriarch
were already named and divided. The Arabians
say that they have named Enoch Edris, on account
of his learning.

" That the invention of the Zodiac ought to be
attributed to the antediluvians may appear to some
a rash and idle conjecture; but I shall not renounce
this conjecture merely because it may startle those
who never thought of it before. Tradition has told
several of the Oriental nations that the antediluvian^
were eminently skilled in astronomy ; and tradition
has generally some foundation in truth. When
Bailly undertook to write the history of astronomy,
he found at the outset certain fragments of science
which proved to him the existence of a system in
some remote age and anterior to all regular history,
if we except the fragment in the book of Genesis.

484 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

As all the emblems in the similarly divided Zodiacs
of India, Chaldea, Bactria. Arabia, Egypt are nearly
alike, it would seem they had followed some com-
mon model ; and to whom should we attribute its
invention but to their common ancestors ?" (On the
Zodiacs of Esne and Denderah, pp. 38-40.)

Drummond was once a skeptic. In his earlier
work, CEdipus Judaicus, he treated the Scriptures
with much disrespect. But when he came to search
into the originals of human history and science, and
to investigate the remains of early antiquity, he came
to the convictions above expressed, and in the essay
quoted gives full confidence to the biblical records.
And the conclusions to which he came respecting
the mathematical and astronomical knowledge of the
ancients have since his time received abundant con-
firmation.

Goodsir, in his Homilies on Ethnic Inspiration,
takes the ground that, as it is unnatural and rash
to suppose that God never taught any of the human
race, nor led any of them to see, during those early
generations, the scientific truth respecting these won-
drous creations of His own that shine in the heavens,
so there is solid reason to believe that some were so
led, and were taught .s^/ra-scientifically those things,
and that there is proof of it now which all who are
willing to investigate will find as clear as the noon-
day sun.

One part of this proof he finds in the great Pyra-
mid of Egypt, the first, greatest, most perfect, and
most scientific building now upon the face of the

SCIENCE AND THE CONSTELLATIONS. 485

earth, and constructed certainly more than four
thousand years ago. By the scientific labors of
many within the last twenty years it has been as-
certained and clearly demonstrated that there is in
the measures, pointings, form, and features of that
great primeval monument, whosoever built it and
for whatever purpose, a massive and indestructible
stone memorial of a complete and faultless know-
ledge of the structure of the universe, of the exact
and physical sciences both terrestrial and cosmical,
a determination of a perfect system of weights and
measures scientifically conformed to what the Opifex
Mundi fixed in things when he fetched a compass
round the worlds and weighed the hills in balances.
Scientific investigation on the part of different men
competent to the task have made it clear that there
is built into that edifice a record of the condition of
the starry heavens at the time of its erection which
gives its age by astronomy in full accord with all
external indications and evidences ; also a record of
the size, form, and weight of the earth and its rela-
tion to and distance from the sun, the true length
of the solar year, the number of years in the pre-
cessional cycle, the average temperature of the hab-
itable world, together with multitudinous cosmical
facts and mathematical formulas and proportions no
better told by any science now existing among men.
Nay, more, says this author : " The unquestionable
and remarkable coincidences between the structure
of the Great Pyramid and astronomical facts find an
exact place amongst, and give consistency and form

4i*

486 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

to, what may be called a collection of astronomical
and physical traditions, the whole of which, in the
result, corroborates the standard chronology and
history of the race." (See my book, A Miracle in
Stone.)

The demonstration is thus before our eyes, open
to every one's examination, that there was a true
scientific astronomy anterior to Herodotus, the fa-
ther of modern history, and before Hesiod and Ho-
mer, which took the Zodiac and the constellations
as an essential part of it, whose teachers and pro-
fessors were no more Ptolemists or Jasperites than
the Newtons and Herschels of modern times, and
who possessed, and could architecturally embody
for the reading of the long after ages, as pure an 1
sound a knowledge of the heavens as any who have
lived since our astronomy has cast off the swaddling-
clothes of its babyhood. The evidence is here that
those who invented the constellations and made the
most of them, and noted the apparent motions of
the sun with other travellers of the circuit of the
heavens, were as good Copernicans as Copernicus
himself thousands of years before Copernicus was
born, and who were favored with a vastly broader
and deeper insight into the economy of the universe
than Copernicus ever dreamed of. No power or in-
telligence of man to-day can convict them of igno-
rance in any point as to any " indisputable facts of
science." Their work has come down to us through
long intervening ages of darkness, superstition, and
apostasj', so superior to the after intelligence of the

THE BIBLE AND THE CONSTELLATIONS. 4S7

race that it was no longer in human power so much
as to understand it until the advances made within
the last few centuries. And just in proportion as
solid science grows and comes to fixed results do
these primeval lights loom up as the very kings of
mind, whose sublime comprehension of Jehovah's
works we are only beginning to approximate. In
five thousand years the world has not been able to
go beyond them in these matters. They knew " the
indisputable facts of science," and with that science
and to that science they framed the constellations,
whatever else they meant to record by the names,
figures, and explanations which they attached to
them as they present themselves to human obser-
vation.

The Bible and the Constellations.

One reviewer just quoted makes the further point :
" If these constellations, in their names, etc., with all
their mythological associations, mean what the au-
thor claims for them, how strange that we have no
intimation of it in the Scriptures !"

This exclamation is meant to indicate an argument,
but it is an argument which makes unwarranted as-
sumptions, and rests on a 11011 sequitur for its conclu-
sions. If there were no mention at all of the constel-
lations in the Bible, that silence might perhaps still
admit of explanation, and, whether explainable or
not, it still would not follow that inspired men had
nothing to do with them. But it is not true that the
Scriptures are totally silent touching the existence,

488 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

origin, intent, and meaning of the constellations, as
will presently be shown, although direct biblical allu-
sions to the subject are not numerous.

Approaching the matter solely from the side of
what we rest on as the record of all that God has
revealed concerning His plan of grace, it is natural
to feel a little surprise that the Bible does not more
appeal to and rest on the older record of the same
things in the constellations. But a closer contem-
plation of the peculiarities of the case shows that we
should not be thus surprised even though the theory
of this book be thoroughly and unmistakably true.

It must be remembered that all the books of the
Bible, with the exception of the book of Job, were
primarily and most immediately intended for the
children of Israel, as the giving of these books was
exclusively to and through that people. The entire
calling and mission of Israel, its peculiar and em-
phatic segregation from all other peoples, and its
special training and development for a particular
purpose in the divine plan, thus necessarily come
into the question and furnish an important element
in reaching a correct answer to it. Whatever might
tend to obscure or diminish the broad lines of sepa-
ration between Israel and the other portions of the
human family, was against the call of Abraham, and
hence was to be avoided by all true Israelites. In
every possible direction we observe the utmost pre-
caution to keep Israel in complete isolation. Not-
only in religious observances, but in the entire law,
ceremonial, civil, domestic, even to the minute details

THE BIBLE AND THE CONSTELLA TIONS. 489

of dietetics, there was a studied fencing off of this
people from all other inhabitants of the earth. The
observance of these laws, the worth of which in some
instances cannot otherwise be traced, was the test of
their loyalty. Nothing in common with the rest
of the world was regarded with favor or could law-
fully be.

Now, it is a matter of scriptural record that there
was a primeval revelation of the Gospel made to man
immediately after the Fall. It must have been a
very clear and full revelation, or it could not have
sufficed for the comfort and saving of the early patri-
archs. The New Testament is specific in telling us
that there were inspired prophets from the very
foundation of the world, and that what they taught
and prophesied was precisely that which has been
or is yet to be fulfilled in and through Christ. (See
Luke 1 : 69, 70 and Acts 3:21.) This Gospel neces-
sarily went abroad with the multiplication of the
race, first through all the antediluvian generations,
and then through and from Noah to all his descend-
ants. Above all, if the first prophets — Adam, Seth,
and Enoch — did connect the truths of the primitive
revelation with astronomy, and hung the full record
of the Gospel promise upon the stars by means of
the pictures and names in the constellations, it neces-
sarily was the common possession of all the early
nations, as we find from the traditions and records
which have been preserved that the constellations
were. There was then what we might call the prim-
itive Ethnic Revelation — the original divine Gospel

49° THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

— whose line went out through all the earth for all
people alike.

Through the working of the depravity, perverse-
ness, and consequent deterioration of the descend-
ants of Noah that Gospel became greatly obscured
and lost. Even the records and illustrations of it
which the ancient prophets had inscribed upon the
sky, through the evil genius of Nimrod and the
seductions of the great enemy of souls had become
almost universally prostituted to idolatry and degrad-
ing superstition, just as the brazen serpent, which
Moses made by divine direction, was prostituted
among the Israelites. Sabaism, the worship of the
figures of the constellations, and the turning of these
celestial signs into instruments of fortune-telling and
an impious astrology, had arisen upon what holy
hands by sacred impulse had connected with the
stars as God's promise of salvation through the
Seed of the woman. The very sacredness of the
thing was a power to help on the accursed perver-
sion. And thus in the wisdom and goodness of
God it was ordained to select and train a separate
and distinct people to be the depository of a re-enun-
ciation of His plan and promises of grace, and out
of whom to develop the chosen Servant of God who
was to bring the great salvation. That people was
Israel, and that Servant, the inmost centre of Israel,
was the Christ.

In this new start of the kingdom of God it was
needless — and would have really been a weakening
of the whole procedure — to appeal to the old ethnic

THE BIBLE AND THE CONSTELLATIONS. 49 1

records, which had become so abused and perverted
to that very state of things which the new start was
meant to offset and remedy. It was enough to take
the old promise as it had been given at the first, to
recognize the prophetic character of those to whom
it was given, and who found in it their hope and
their salvation, and to reannounce and re-embody
that promise in special forms among a people chosen
and separated for the purpose. And just this is what-
was done, in which there was no occasion whatever
to make appeal to what the heathen had, and had so
terribly perverted, or to mix up the common posses-
sion of the world with the training of a people called
to be separate in all things from all others. As we
cannot conceive of Christ enforcing His teachings
by appealing to the sayings and opinions of heathen
sages who lived before Him, however true they may
have been, and as we would feel it strange if Moses
had sought to intensify faith in his laws and precepts
by showing that they accorded with " all the wisdom
of the Egyptians," so it would have been incongru-
ous in the Israelitish prophets to appeal to the Chal-
dean astronomers to supplement or support their
predictions of " the sufferings of Christ and the glory
that should follow," however truly the same things
may have been set forth in the constellations.

The Jewish people were, moreover, so prone to
take up with the worst idolatries of the nations
around them, even with all the precautions and
stern laws to prevent it, that it would have increased
and facilitated that proclivity had their sacred proph-

49 2 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ets mixed up with their instructions any prominent
references to what was so deeply interwoven with all
the living idolatries of the time. For this reason it
perhaps was that, in the Jewish Zodiac, all the figures
were expunged and the letters of the Hebrew alpha-
bet substituted in their place. It was to guard against
ethnic idolatries, all of which were more or less con-
nected with the constellations, which the nations had
utterly perverted from their true meaning and intent.

The whole condition of things in the general world,
and the whole intention with regard to the Israelitish
people, thus come in to show that, however truly the
Gospel may have been set forth in the original in-
vention of the constellations, it would have been a
hazardous and very unfitting thing for the Hebrew
prophets to make their appeal to the ancient astron-
omy, which, by the depravities of men, had become
the chief foundation of the idolatries, false worships,
auguries, and astrologies then so dreadfully debas-
ing the entire world around them.

So far, then, as respects the sacred books issuing
from the Jewish prophets, there is every reason to
expect little or no reference to the ethnic records of
the primeval revelations. The simple absence of any
condemnation of the constellations, then held sacred
by all the nations, and so much perverted by them,
is more marvellous than the absence of appeals to
them as records of the original promise of a Re-
deemer to come. It argues that in the mind of the
Spirit there was still some reserve with regard to
that system as not a thing of mere human invention

THE BOOK OF JOB. 493

or to be denounced with heathenism in general.
The particular purpose of the call of Israel had no
special use for that system, and too much regard to
it would have so militated against that calling that
the wonder is that the Jewish prophets never once
assail it or speak one word against it, even while
burdened with messages of the wrath and punish-
ment of God upon heathenism and idolatry. Had
that system been nothing but an outgrowth of the
wild imaginations of man, incorporated as it was
with the false religions then dominating over all the
world, it is next thing to impossible to explain why
it was not pre-eminently singled out for prophetic
malediction ; and any recognition of it at all in the
prophetic books, as connected with a proper under-
standing of things, is a powerful consideration in
favor of its prophetic origin and sacred intent.

The Book of Job.

The book of Job, however, did not originate with
the Jewish prophets. It was written before Israel's
time and outside of the Israelitish race. Though by
inspiration adopted into the list of the Hebrew canon
prepared by the special inspiration of God, it belongs
to the ethnic records of the primeval revelations, and
embodies the sacred light and truth of those revela-
tions as received, held, and exemplified in its time
by the purest and truest of the ethnic believers. It
is a sort of encyclopaedia of the faith, life, thinking,
worship, and wisdom of God's people before Moses

42

494 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

and outside of Israel. As an ethnic book divinely-
inspired we would expect to find in it references to
whatever belonged to the ethnic records and teach-
ings respecting the true God and the Redeemer that
was promised, including the system of the constella-
tions, if indeed that system was of primitive prophetic
origin and meant to record and illustrate the Gospel
as first revealed to man. In such a book, from such
a source and age, and with such an object, we would
certainly expect to find allusions to these frescoes on
the heavens if they be what is affirmed of them in
these Lectures. Nay, the absence of such allusions
here would necessarily argue either that no such
system as that of the constellations existed in Job's
time, or that, if existing, it had nothing whatever to
to do with the revelations and promises of God.

In this particular instance the argument suggested
by our reviewer would apply in full force, and would
be next thing to conclusive against our theory, if
there were no intimations in the book of Job as to its
reality. But what we hardly should expect in the
Jewish prophets we do find here in this exhibit of
the pure ethnic faith and piety. At least five of the
principal constellations are referred to by name in
the book of Job :

I. "Arcturus" (Azs/i), which nearly all the best
commentators, Jewish and Christian, take as denot-
ing the north polar constellation now known under
the name of Ursa Major, the Great Bear (chaps. 9 : 9
and 38:32).

?.. "Orion" so named by Homer hundreds of years

THE BOOK OF JOB. 495

before the time of the earliest Greek philosophers,
and called Kesil in chaps. 9 : 9 and 38 : 31.

3. Taurus, by its centre and chief mark, "The Plei-
ades" (Kimah), the Seven Stars (chaps. 9 : 9 and
38 : 32). The Arabians, according to Hafiz, considered
the Pleiades the seal or seat of immortality. Maedler,
in modern times, from observations of the motions
of the so-called " fixed stars," has pointed out the
centre of this group (Alcyone) as the great central
Sun of the universe, around which all others revolve.
In all the ancient myths and traditions this group
of stars plays a most conspicuous part, and is ever
associated with benignity and blessedness. And
" the sweet influences of Pleiades " are here referred
to after the same manner, as perhaps embodying the
universal centre of gravitation as well as ushering in
the genial spring.

4. Scorpio, the constellation directly opposite to
Taurus, described in the English version as " the
chambers of the south (chap. 9:9). That the refer-
ence is to some asterism of the same sort as the
three with which it is named it would be arbitrary
to doubt. Some think it refers to such of the con-
stellations as were hidden below the southern hori-
zon in the time and latitude of Job ; but the definite-
ness in the three preceding references would seem
to require that we should take this as equally defi-
nite. The mention of a house to the south, over
against the Pleiades, would call for a particular Zodi-
acal constellation, which would necessarily be Scor-
pio. Aben Ezra, E. S. Poole, and others translate it

496 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

Scorpio, and so Dr. Hales, Dr. Brinkley, President
Gouget, and M. Ducoutant take it, and calculate the
age in which Job lived from these notations.

5. Hydra, "The Fleeing Serpent" (chap. 26: 13).
The best interpreters agree that the reference here
must be to one of the constellations ; and of all the
stellar serpents there is no one to answer the descrip-
tion so completely as the vast constellation of Hydra.

This gives two signs of the Zodiac and three other
constellations. But the Zodiac as a whole, with its
succession of signs and seasons, is recognized and
spoken of: " Canst thou bring forth MazzarotJi in
his season?" — in the margin, "The Twelve Signs!'
Rosenmuller, Herder, Umbreit, Gesenius, and many
others, with the Jewish authors at their head, under-
stood by it nothing more nor less than signa cclestia,
the celestial signs — "The Zodiac!' The word means
the separated, set apart, divided, apportioned, as the
spaces given to the twelve signs in the circle of the
Zodiac, and which mark the successive seasons in
the year. Selden informs us that in later Jewish
writings Mazzalbtli are the signs of the Zodiac, and
the singular, Mazzal, is used to denote signs singly.
Mazzalbth is the same in later Hebrew that Mazza-
rotJi was in the more ancient forms. Everything
about it goes to confirm the rendering in the mar-
gin of our English Bibles, and to prove that the
Zodiac with its twelve distinct spaces, signs, or
houses, bringing forward the seasons in their succes-
sion, is what is meant.

And with the twelve signs of the Zodiac recog-

THE BOOK OF JOB. 407

nized, and three of the Decans besides, the whole
system of the constellations is necessarily implied
and included, while the entire showing is directly
associated with the work, majesty, and glory of
God.

Nay, the book speaks of a general garnishing of
the heavens, which would imply that there was a
dividing off of the whole face of the sky into groups
and pictures, just as we find in the ancient constella-
tions (see chap. 26 : 13). Barnes finds in this garn-
ishing the "pictures of the heavens, with a somewhat
fanciful resemblance to animals, etc., one of the most
early devices of astronomy still continued as aiding
in the description of the heavenly bodies." Nor is
there any adequate reason for taking the reference
in any other way.

Thus it clearly appears that the constellations were
known and determined in Job's time, and that they
were well understood and much in view in the sacred
contemplations of the believers of that age.

But the record goes still farther. This garnishing
of the heavens, this grouping of the stars in pictures
on the face of the sky, is here affirmed and claimed
to be the zvork of God Himself by His Spirit. The
declaration concerning the Lord of Creation and
Providence is : " By His Spirit He garnished the
heavens ; His hand hath formed the crooked [fleeing]
serpent" (chap. 26: 13). There is here the ancient
poetic parallelism, giving the general statement in
one line and the repetition of the same in particular
in the next. The intimation is not that the forming

42 2 G

49$ THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

of the fleeing serpent — Hydra — is a thing separate
and distinct from the garnishing of the heavens, but
that it is a specimen of that sacred garnishing, that
we may determine and know from a specific part
what is the true character of the whole. The sub-
ject is t-he formation and arrangement of the figures
of the constellations ; and that work is unqualifiedly-
ascribed to the Spirit of God, to prophetic inspira-
tion— the same as the biblical records are ascribed to
the Holy Ghost.

This gives us scriptural evidence that the most
approved and pious of the old ethnic believers con-
sidered and interpreted the constellations as from
God, and as containing a sacred record of great con-
sequence and worth in connection with their faith
and hopes. And it is thus more than likely that
from the stars, as much as from any other records
and traditions, Job derived that triumphant evangelic
confidence : " I know that my Redeemer liveth, and
that He shall stand at the latter day upon the earth :
and though after my skin worms destroy this body,
yet in my flesh shall I see God : whom I shall see
for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not an-
other; though my reins be consumed within me"
(Job 19: 25-27).

Now, this book of Job, with these presentations in
it, has become a part of the canon of Holy Scripture,
certainly not without inspired sanction. The same
Spirit which moved the Hebrew prophets has thus
recognized the ethnic inspiration, and hence also
these claims with reference to the constellations. It

THE HEBREW PROPHETS. 499

is therefore a false assumption to say that " we have
no intimation in the Scriptures " of what is sought
to be shown in these Lectures.

The Hebrew Prophets.

But even the Hebrew prophets, being moved by
the same Spirit which was in the ancient ethnic be-
lievers, have not been totally silent touching these
uses of the stars. The book of Genesis is largely made
up of early records held to be sacred, distorted frag-
ments of which have come down through all the
more ancient peoples ; and the quotations of those
records in the foundation-book of the volume of
inspiration appear in the Bible with precisely the
same allusions which attend them everywhere else.

Thus, in the very first chapter of Genesis, in the
account of the creation of the celestial luminaries,
there is a distinct statement of their appointment
and uses, including and specifying one which can in
no possible way be satisfactorily and adequately ex-
plained in fidelity to the divine Word without ad-
mitting what we claim for the ancient system of the
constellations. It is there written that "God said,
Let there be lights [luminaries, light-bearers] in the
firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the
night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and
for days, and for years : . . . and it was so " (Gen.
I : 14, 15).

Whatever this being "for signs " may mean, it is
here affirmed to be one of the intended uses of the
heavenly luminaries. It is also included in the state-

5<X> THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

ment that God is the author of that use, that it was
instituted and established by Himself, and, furthei
still, that said use was a matter of fact at the time
this record was made ; for it is added, " It was so."

It has been one of the standing perplexities of com-
mentators to explain what this making of the heav
enly orbs into " signs " can mean, apart from " sea-
sons," " days," and " years " which depend upon
their natural revolutions. Admit into the case the
divine formation of the primeval constellations, and
the whole statement takes on a grand meaning,
worthy of so solemn and magnificent a record ; but
let that out, and our expositors are all at sea, with-
out chart or compass, and without the possibility of
suggesting anything worthy of the record or of them-
selves. In other words, they can do nothing with it
deserving of serious respect, and the whole thing in
this grandest of all narrations, in which every word
is overflowing with the profoundest meaning, evap-
orates into a bundle of puerile, contradictory and
unverifiable human conceits.

There is in the sacred statement an element of his-
toric fact overlooked by our commentators, but pre-
senting some clue to the real meaning. It is affirmed
that at the time of the making of the statement the
use of the heavenly orbs as " signs " existed. The
record is plain : God said, "Let them be for signs, . . .
and it was so." The record itself dates far back be-
yond Moses, for the same, in almost the same terms,
has been found in the cuneiform writings made more
than two thousand years before Christ. The same

THE HEBRE W PR OPHE TS. 50 1

is also found in some sort traditionally preserved
among all the primitive peoples, who must have de-
rived it from one common source antedating the
Babel dispersion. It certainly belongs to the time
of Noah, who perhaps was the prophet of God who
originally wrote it, and from whom the world after
him received it.

Was there anything, then, in Noah's time of such
note and sacredness as to answer to the statement
of the actual use of the heavenly bodies as a system
of " signs " ? Unquestionably there was, and that
system was the system of the constellations. This
is not a matter of guess or inference, but a matter of
positive record dating back to Noah's time, and now
brought to light in the exhumed remains of the an-
cient Assyrians and Chaldeans. Nay, among those
remains there has been recovered a written account
of the Creation answering in every vital particular to
the account in Genesis, and furnishing what may be
regarded as the primeval commentary on the bibli-
cal account of the creation of the heavenly orbs,
especially with reference to the particular statement
touching their divine appointment as " signs." A
translation of this tablet-record is given at page 407,
as furnished by Smith and Sayce, who add that it
tells about " the constellations of the stars, the signs
of the Zodiac" etc., as God's creation, and that it
occupies the place of, and is equivalent to, the
phrase in Genesis which speaks of the forming of
the heavenly orbs into " signs!' Even the whole
system of the constellations is given in detail in

502 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

these tablets, and ascribed to the great God as His
work at the beginning.

This is the oldest paraphrase of the words in Gen-
esis known to man. It was made more than four
thousand years ago. It agrees with all the old
ethnic traditions and beliefs. There is nothing what-
ever to show that it is at all at variance with the
truth. It harmonizes with the literal sense of the
words of the Bible, and corresponds with every point
they contain or suggest. And it must needs go very
far to fix the meaning of the sacred record on this
particular item to be, that in appointing the celestial
orbs "for signs " God instituted a system of symbols
and indications by means of them from which man-
kind might ever read the revelations of special divine
importance, and that this system is nothing more nor
less than the system of the constellations, everywhere
and always called " the signs."

Here, then, among the fundamental presentation
of the Scriptures, we have not only " intimation," but
something of a positive assertion, that the astronomic
system of the constellations is of divine origin, and
that it has in it the record of divine revelations.
Delitzsch agrees that the statement, in part at least,
refers to the astronomic signs, the constellations.

A less direct, but an equally striking, indication
of the same thing appears in the vast range of vivid
coincidences between the imagery, symbolism, and
general diction, the doctrines and the prophecies, of
Holy Scripture, and the pictures, names, and images
which appear in these ancient " signs." So largely

THE NEW TESTAMENT. 503

and so completely does the one answer to the other
that infidels have seized upon this correspondence to
prove that Christianity has been derived from the
myths of the constellations. No one can look at the
texts cited in this book in connection with the con-
stellations, one after the other, without being struck
with the marvellous analogy throughout. But how
could all this have been, or hold good through so
vast a system, except on the admission that the same
God who has given us the Gospel was equally con-
cerned in the making of the constellations as a
grand prophetic record of what, in the fulness of
time, should be accomplished by " the Seed of the
woman " ?

See also what is said (p. 27-29) on the nineteenth
Psalm, which certainly cannot be fairly gone through
with without finding intimation of a sacred voice and
record on the starry heavens beyond what the celes-
tial orbs can naturally tell apart from the system of
the constellations.

The New Testament.
And even in the histories of the New Testament
St. Matthew narrates a case of practical demonstra-
tion that the sublimest elements of the Gospel rev-
elation could be learned from the stars, and were so
learned by the Wise Men in such clear and convin-
cing perfection that they undertook a long and ex-
pensive journey to pay their adoration to the new-
born King of grace and salvation. Commentators
talk of the diffusion of what was written by the He-

504 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

brew prophets, and have racked their brains and ex-
hausted their erudition to find out possibilities as to
how these Wise Men came to the amount of evan-
gelic knowledge and faith by which they were
moved ; but it is, after all, nothing but guesswork,
and an obtrusion into the record of what it does not
at all embrace or warrant. The account is that the
Magi came to Jerusalem led by astronomical indica-
tions; hence the suggestion of anything else is im-
pertinent and contrary to the inspired statements. It
is possible that they may have had some extraordi-
nary illuminations of the Spirit of God in connec-
tion with the matter of their coming, as they had in
connection with the way of their returning ; but the
record says that they had their convictions and guid-
ance from the stars, and we have no right to inter-
polate anything else. And if the stars could so
evangelically enlighten and lead them as to the
coming of the Saviour, His birth as a child, His
worshipful nature, the time and neighborhood of
His advent, and His claims upon the faith of man-
kind, then the stars must have upon them an evan-
gelic record capable of being read, and of conduct-
ing men to faith in Him who was born at Bethlehem,
crucified on Calvary, and ordained Captain of salva-
tion to bring many sons to glory. Hozv the stars
were made to fulfil such an office is shown in detail
in this book ; and that they actually did it in the
case of these Magi we have from the pen of an in-
spired apostle of the Church.

There is, then, no such silence of the Scriptures

THE STAR BIBLE. 505

touching the origin and meaning of the constella-
tions, or of the connection of evangelic prophecy
with astronomy, as to make us wonder at the doc-
trine set forth in this book or to raise a reasonable
suspicion against its truth.

The Star Bible.

It is a matter of interest to one who has entered
an uncultivated field, and who has come to import-
ant conclusions which some, for want of better in-
formation, regard as wild and foolish, to find serious
thinkers entering the same field and boldly enunci-
ating similar convictions. No man can advance far
in the study of the mystery of the constellations
without being convinced of the richness and import-
ance of the subject, or without a feeling of wonder
that so little attention has been bestowed upon it.
But antiquarian research has been showing such
brilliant results within the present generation that it
is impossible for this territory to be left uncultivated
much longer. To show that it is worthy of explor-
ation, and to enlist Christian thinking and scholar-
ship in the grand possibilities which its proper inves-
tigation is likely to develop, have been among the
chief objects of this book ; and the author has been
gratified to find that a venerable German pastor was
engaged in a like effort contemporaneously with
himself.

There has very recently come to hand a volume,
published in 1883, entitled The Chaldean Star-Bible ;
or, The Starry Heavens according to the Seven Stages
43

506 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS

of the Mithras-Mysteries in Seven Spheres as the Way
to Completion for Time and Eternity, again after cen-
turies presented anew, by Rev. George Karch* The
method adopted by this writer differs materially from
that pursued in The Gospel in the Stars, and is quite
too indirect to produce satisfactory results ; but it
nevertheless develops much the same conclusions.
Believing that the constellations stand in vital con-
nection with the primitive divine revelations, and
with the purest worship of the ancients anterior to
and outside of Israel, he endeavors to trace some
of the vital elements of the old Iranian or Mithras
religion among various ancient peoples — Aryans,
Bactrians, Indians, Medes, Persians, Magi, etc. — and
deduces from the connection between this ancient
cult and the stellar signs many elements of the true
biblical faith and hope of the ethnic believers. In
this line of inquiry he would naturally reach general
conclusions quite agreeing with those more directly
developed in The Gospel in the Stars. The book em-
braces forty-five pages of introduction and two hun-
dred and twenty-six additional pages of particular
discussion, to which is appended a chart of the con-
stellations. There is some lack of thorough elabor-
ation in the way the argument is conducted, but
there is in it a grasping after the truth, with serious

* Die Chaldmsche Sternenbibel, oder der Sternenhimmel nach
den 7 Stufen der Mithras-Mysterien in 7 Gebieten als der Weg zur
Vollendung fur Zeit und Ewigkeit wieder nach Jahrhunderten neu
dargastellt, von George Karch, Pfarrer. Wurzburg, Druch von J. II
Fleischmann, 1883.

THE STAR BIBLE. 50/

conviction that there is something in this ancient
system of star-pictures of infinitely more significance
and worth than the modern world has even remotely
suspected.

To show the beliefs and conclusions of this writer,
and how they conform to and sustain what we have
endeavored to set forth, a few extracts from different
parts of the book are here translated, which will be
of interest to those who are disposed to entertain
the subject :

" Closer examination with regard to the constel-
lations which make up the Ecliptic," he says, " gives
assurance that there must be an intentional symbol-
ization in the selection and combination of the an-
cient pictures of the star-groups. The very fact that
many of these figures are so remotely and vaguely
traceable in the stars themselves bespeaks design in
the choice and formation of them, especially when
we take in the pious fancy of the old Orientals and
their fondness for emblems and likenesses. I am per-
suaded that the starry heavens, according to the re-
ligious contemplations of the oldest astronomers,
present a picture-gallery of doctrinal and rich spirit-
ual significance."

" Albertus Magnus has written (De Universd) that
all the mysteries of the Incarnation, from the Con-
ception on to the Ascension into heaven, are shown
us on the face of the sky and are signified by the
stars."

" Not from the ruins of Nineveh, not from the
Rosetta Stone, but there in the heights above us —

508 THE GOSPEL IN THE STARS.

there where the holy Magi beheld the Saviour's star
—we find the primordial record and testimony of
the way of God to us, and of our way back to God.
It is there written on the heavens, to be seen and
read of all men."

" The old Persian sphere, as Aben Ezra found it,
and as may be read, according to Scaliger, in Peta-
vius and Dupuis, has for each of the Twelve Signs
three separate figures or constellations — three De-
cans. The foundation (fundamental idea) of these
three Decans is given in general in the regular zo-
diacal sign to which they belong ; but they give that
general idea in different and special pictures."

" These old forty-eight constellations all belong to
one great hieroglyphical system, and all cohere as
one original casting. They have an enigmatic mean-
ing. They are sacred monuments. Rightly under-
stood, they are a kind of Holy Scriptures in sym-
bolic form, given as a witness to all nations, to aid
and enlighten reason and to testify of higher divine
truth."

"As these star-pictures have a symbolic meaning
of their own, it also follows that many of the heathen
myths will be found to correspond with them, along
with other analogies. The classic myths incontro-
vertibly connect with these appearances and move-
ments of the heavenly bodies, and, certainly in their
most inward meaning, stand related to these star-
signs and what they were meant to express, since
they are the same, with only a few local modifica-
tions, among all peoples."

THE STAR BIBLE. 509

" Likewise, the alphabet of the Holy Scriptures
embodies a record and expression of the glory of
God, the same as it is written on the heavens."

This author speaks of himself as advanced in life,
and says that, being relieved from other engage-
ments, he considered it most fitting for him to em-
ploy his declining years in endeavoring to become
better acquainted with the heavens, and to do some
work toward a better understanding of the symbol-
ism portrayed in the ancient system of the constella-
tions— "the beauty of heaven,. the glory of the stars,
an ornament giving light in the highest place of the
Lord " (Ecclesiasticus 43 : 91).
43*

INDEX

Besides the ordinary indication of subjects, this Index contains a
Glossary of the names which occur in the constellations and by
which particular stars were anciently called. The meanings of
these names are largely determined by the ancient Hebrew or Noetic
roots from which they are formed, and the significations are given
according to the best lexicons and philological authorities.

A.

Abarbanel, 436, 439.

Aben Ezra, 7, 45, 46, 101, 467,
495/5o8.

Abraham, God's oath to, 311.

Action, 308.

Acubene, the sheltering, the hid-
ing-place, resting, 321.

Adam, 258, 374, 398, 412, 474,
483, 489-

Adhara, the glorious, 302.

Adige, flying swiftly, 205.

Adom, cutting off. 101.

^Esculapius, 126; children of,
127; pictured Christ, 128.

Al, the ancient Noetic article.

Albertus Magnus, 507.

Achbiya, the fountain of pouring,
368.

Al Akrab, the Scorpion, wound-
ing, conflict, war, 117.

Al Azal, the branch, 75.

Al Belda, hastily coming, 367.

Al Botein, the treading under
foot, 368.

Albumazer, 7, 23, 45, 60, 76,
467, 470.

Al Chiba, tho curse inflicted,
355.

Alcyone, 495.

Al Debaran, the Captain, the
Governor, 264, 369.

Al Deramin, quickly returning,
223.

Al Dib, the reptile, 159.

Al Dibah, the slain in sacrifice,
made accursed, 368.

Al Dirah, the ill-treated, 369.

Al Gedi, the kid, the chosen of
the flock, 324.

Al Genib, who carries off, 250.

Al Giebha, the exalted, 346, 369.

Al Gol, the evil spirit, 254.

Al Gomeiza, burdened, enduring
for others' sakes, 307.

Al Gubi, heaped up high, 93.

Al Habor, the mighty, 302.

Al Heka, the driving away, 369.

Al Henah, the hurt, the wound-
ed, 290, 369.

Al Iclil, the complete submis-
sion, 367.

Alioth, the ewe or mother, 327.

Al Katd, the assembled, the
gathered together, 324, 327.

Al Kalb, the wounding, cleav-
ing, 367.

Al Katurops, the Branch, the
rod, 84.

511

512

INDEX.

Almagest of Ptolemy, 464, 466.

Al Naim, the gracious, the de-
lighted, 367.

Al Naish, or Annaish, the or-
dered, the assembled, 327.

Al Nethra, the treasure, the
possession, 369.

Al Okab, wounded in the heel,
180.

Al Oneh, the weakened, the sub-
dued, 254.

Alphabet and Astronomy, 62,

509.

Al Phard, the separated, exclu-
ded, put away, 351.

Al Pherg al Muchaddem, prog-
eny cf ancient times, 368.

Al Pherg al Muachher, prog-
eny of the later times, 368.

Al Pherkadain, the calves, the
young, the redeemed, 324.

Al Phiratz, the broken-down,
228, 243.

Al Phirk, the Redeemer, 224.

Al Risha, the band or bridle,
49, 220, 368.

Al Sad, he who tears, lays waste,
346.

Al Samaca, the upheld, 215.

Al Serpha, the burning, 369.

Al Shain, the bright, the blood-
stained, 179.

Al Shaula, the sting, the deadly
wound, 367.

Al Sheratan, the bruised, the
wounded, the cut-off, 235, 368.

Al Tair, the wounded, the torn,
179.

Al Terpha, the healed, the de-
livered, 369.

Al Thuraiya, the enemy pun-
ished, 368.

Al Waid, one to be destroyed,

159.

Al Zimach, the shoot, 75.

Al Zubena, the buying back, re-
demption, 92, 367.

Al Zubra, the heaped-up, 369.

Americus Vespucius, 469.

Ancients, their knowledge, 388
seq., 392> 484.

Andromeda, 49, 225 seq. ; sym-
bol of the Church on earth,
228.

Antares, wounding, cutting,
tearing. 118.

Anubis, the god, 307.

Apocalypse quoted, 29, 90, 109,
121, 145, 148, 153, 158, 186,
210, 227, 233, 244, 245, 256,
265, 268, 276, 295, 298, 299,
304, 334, 335, 348,, 353, 354,

358, 359> 3&3-

Aquarius, the Waterman, 42,
192.

Aquila, the pierced eagle, 49,
179, 180.

Ara, the altar of burning, 48,
150.

Aratus, 132, 325.

Arbedi, covering, 471.

Arcturus, guardian of the nap-
py, 84, 494.

Argo, the company of travellers,
329, 330.

Argument of this book, 362,
462; of skeptics, 5, 67.

Arided, he shall come down,
205.

Aries, the Ram or Lamb, 43, 235,
237, 240.

Ark, the, 479.

Arnebeth, the hare, enemy ot
the coming, 298.

Arrow, the, of law and justice,
176 seq.

Artaud, 470.

Arx, Areas, Arktos, the strong-
hold of the saved, 325.

Aryeh, he who rends, 346.

ASCALIUS, 76.

Ash, or Aish, the congregation,

327-

Asmidiska, the travellers re-
leased, 332.

Astarte, 198.

INDEX.

51?

ASTREA, 73, 93.

Astrology, 46, 71, 412, 490.

Astronomers, ancient, 60, 482,
486.

Astronomy, figures in, 3, 36— see
Constellations; mysteries of,
32; origin of, 34, 55, 387 ; sys-
tems of, 481 ; primeval, 39 seq.

Atik, he who breaks, 249.

Atonement, 94, 105 ; salvation
by, 185.

Auriga, the Shepherd, 49, 279.

Aurochs, or Reem, 259 seq.

Azel, who goes and returns, 205 ;
or the same as Al Azal, 75.

Baalam, 190.

Baleus, 392.

Bailly, 5, 59, 391, 483-

Band, the, of the Fishes, 220; in
hand of the Lamb, 221 ; binds
Cetus, 246, 280 ; see Al Risha.

Barnes, Albert, 53, 497.

Bashti-Beki, the offender con-
founded, 298.

Bayle, 399.

Bear, the Great, 327 ; see Ursa
Major.

Believers, fears of, 459; portion
of, 309.

Bellatrix, swiftly coming, sud-
denly destroying, 270.

Benet Naish, daughters of Aisk,
328.

Berenice's Hair, 47, 78; see
Coma.

Berosus, 171.

Betelguese, the Branch coming,
270.

Bethlehem, star of, 25, 424,
503 ; well of, 442.

Bible, the, only rule of faith, 460;
points to the Gospel in the stars,
28, 29 ; chief contents of, 29-
31, 72, 87; the primitive, 64,
460 ; recognizes the u^c of the
heavenly orbs as "signs," 21,

499; recognizes the constella-
tions, 53, 494-497 ; refers the
same to the inspiration of God,
56, 497 ; on the original man,
47S> as given to Israel, 488;
imagery and diction of, 51, 50^
503.

Blessedness, heavenly, 285.

Bochart, 114, 395.

Books before the Flood, 477 seq.

Bootes, the coming One, 47, 83,
329 ; not a ploughman, 84 ; the
great Shepherd and Harveste!
of souls, 85.

Branch, the, 75.

Brentius, John, 196.

Bull, the, 263 ; see Taurus.

Bundahis, the, on the origin of
the Zodiacs, 406.

C.

Cab'd al Asad, multitude of the
assembled, 327.

Cadmus, 160.

Calisthenes, 389.

Callisto, 328.

Cancer, the Crab, holding, pos-
sessing, rest secured, 43, 312;
myths concerning, 320 ; symbol
of the Church, 313.

Canopus, the possession of Him
who cometh, 331, 332.

Canis Major, 50; see Sirius.

Canis Minor, 50; see Procyon.

CAPELLA,thegoat,atonement,28i.

Caphir, the atonement, propitia-
tion, sacrifice, 367.

Capricornus, the goat, atone-
ment, 42, 163 seq.; myths of,
170; salvation through atone-
ment, 185.

Carlyle, 473.

Cary, 470.

Cassini, 389.

Cassiopeia, the beautiful, the en-
throned, 49 ; symbol of the en-
franchised Church in heaven,
242.

2H

514

INDEX.

Castor, the coming Ruler, 293,

297.
Caul^e, a sheepfold, 328.
Cephetjs, the royal Branch, the

King, 49, 223, 244.
Centaurs, the, 79.
CENTAURUS, the despised, 47,

78 seq., 465 ; victim of, 47,

104.
Cetus, the sea-monster, 49,

245.

Chaldean Tablets, 406, 476,
500.

Cheiron, the pierced, 80 seq. ; a
symbol of Christ, 81, 140.

Chinese on the first man, 393.

Christ, the glory of God, 28;
the Seed of the woman, 30; in
the myths of the Gentile world,
66; His birth of a virgin, 72 ;
the Branch, 75 ; the desired
One, 77 ; double nature of, 78;
foreshadowed in the story of
Cheiron, 80, 140; a Shepherd,
83 ; pictured in Virgo, 85 ; pays
the ransom price, 94 seq. ; en-
dured the cross, 100 ; gave up
His own life, 104, 105 ; limit
of His humiliation, 108;
crowned in heaven, no; a
suffering Saviour, 118; His
conflict with the powers of evil,
120; the great Healer, 81, 124,
126; the vanquisher of evil
powers, 130 seq.; a triumphing
warrior, 140 seq. ; rejoices the
universe with His achieve-
ments, 144 seq. ; the Destroyer
of the enemy, 150 seq.; by
death gives life, 163 seq.; His
death and resurrection, 173,
182 seq., 207; saves by atone-
ment, 185 ; gives the waters of
life, 191 ; pours out the Holy
Ghost, 194 seq.; goes forth in
the gospel, 200; carries and
preaches the cross to all people,
204 seq. ; His beauty, 208 ;

gathers and upholds the Church,
211 seq., 222; the Lamb of
God, 235, 238; a glorious King,
223 ; delivers and glorifies His
people, 242 ; binds Satan, 245 ;
the Breaker, 248; the terrible
Judge, 262 seq. ; the Lion, 101,
340-347 ; in judgment remem-
bers mercy, 279; heavenly
union with His people, 285
seq.; one with His Church,
182, 292; the glorious Prince,
302; the victorious Lion, 340
seq.

Christianity, not borrowed
from mythology, 68-70; com-
mercial idea in, 94.

Christians, belief of, 72-76, 78,
81, 86 seq., 208; symbolized by
fishes, 167, 197, 211 seq. ; trans-
formed persons, 173, 199;
hopes of, 333 ; address to, 256;

. die and rise in and with Christ,
173 seq., 185.

" Christian Union," notice of
this book, 454.

Church, the, rises out of Christ's
sacrifice, 164; pictures of its
development, 312-320 ; its two-
foldness, 217 ; upheld by Christ,
221 ; its glorious King, 223 ; its
state on earth, 225 ; its kingly
character, 226 ; its ill favor with
the world, 230, 294; its illus-
trious Deliverer, 252; its estate
in glory, 242; one with Christ,
292,296 seq. ; its blessed hope,
254; importance of connection
with, 256 seq. ; the beauty of,
244.

" Church Review" on this
book, 455.

Cicero, 23, 116, 405.

Clarke, Adam, 24.

Colchis, citadel of reconciliation,
239. 287, 330.

Coma, the desired One, 47, 76,
440; new star in, 432.

INDEX.

515

Commentators, perplexity over
Gen. 1 : 14, 15, 499.

Conflict, the great, 114 seq.

Confucius, 445.

Conjunctions, planetary, 434;
Kepler on, 435 n.

Consistency, 463.

Constellations, the, 38; the
twelve of the Zodiac, 42 ; the
thirty-six Decans, 45 seq. ;
modern additions, 39, 40, 464;
figures of, 3, 36, 39, 492, 497
(see chart of, at end of this vol-
ume) ; are of sacred signifi-
cance, 4, 22 seq., 507, 508;
sum of their readings, 413-
416; great antiquity of, 58-63,
364-366, 387-404, 482, 501;
claimed to be from God, 404-
409, 497 ; recognized in the
book of job, 494 seq. ; ordi-
nary explanations of, 3, 1 15,
409 n., 461 ; perversions of, 22,
411, 490; their claims to sober
and reverent regard, 64.

Consummation, the, 358.

Copernicus, 481, 482, 486.

Cornucopia, original of, 107.

Corona Australis, 465.

Corvus, the Raven, bird of
doom, 50, 354.

Crab, the, 312 ; see Cancer.

Crater, the cup of wrath, 50,
352.

Creation, intention of, 19; Chal-
dean records concerning, 406.

Criticisms on this book, 458 seq.

Cross, the, 100-104 *» issues in the
crown, 108-1 10 ; feast of, 471.

Cross, the Southern, 47, 98,
463; why omitted by Hippar-
chus and Ptolemy, 465 ; not the
invention of Royer, 465 ; noted
by the highest authorities many
centuries before Royer, 467 ;
Dante and Americus Vespucius
on, 469, 470; Artaud, Hum-
boldt and Dupuis on, 470, 471.

Crown, the Northern, 47,

1 10; the Southern, 465.
Cup, the, 50, 352; see Crater.
Cupid, 215, 216.
Cygnus, the Swan, 48, 203.
Cyrus, 445.

Dabih, the hewn-down, the sac-
rifice slain, 166.

Dagon, 171.

Dante, 469.

Days, of the week, whence
named, 61.

Death, the price of redemption,
97, 100, 104-108.

Decans, parts, faces, the thirty-
six, 45 seq.

Delitzsch, 502.

Delphinus, the Dolphin, resur-
rection, 48, 182.

Deltoton, the uplifted, 235.

Deneb, the Judge to come, 205.

Deneb AL Eced, the Judge com-
ing, seizing, taking, 346.

Denebola, the Judge swiftly
coming, 346.

Devil, the evil one, 123 ; binding
of, 245; seed of, 120; loose
now, 247.

DlODORUS SlCULUS, 479.

Diphda, the overthrown, the

thrust down, 247.
Discoveries, sum of recent, 478.
Dog, the greater, 299 ; see Sirius.
Dog, the lesser, 305 ; see Procyon.
Dolphin, the, 182; see Delphi-
nus.
Draco, the Dragon, the trodden-

on, 29, 48, 53, 154, 159,348;

myths concerning, 160.
Drummond, Sir Wm., 7, 60, 482.
Dubheh, or Dubah, a collection

of domestic animals, herd, fold,

323, 327.
Dubheh Lachar, the later herd

or fold, 327.
Dupuis, 5, 23, 412, 470, 508.

5i6

INDEX.

Eagle, the pierced, 179; see
Aquila.

Ecliptic, the, 40.

Education, New England
Journal of, notice of this
book, 455.

Egyptology, 472, 479.

El Acola, the sheepfold, 327.

El Asieh, the humble, brought
down, 160.

El Athik, the fraudful, 160.

El Kaphrah, the protected, the
covered, the redeemed, 327.

El Nath, or El Natick, wound-
ed, slain, 235.

End, the, 357 seq.

Enemy, the great, 120; see Ser-
pent, Devil, Satan.

Enif, the sprout, the shoot, 201.

Enoch, 60, 62, 376, 395, 483,
489.

Epictetus, 116.

Etanin, the long serpent, 160.

Eridanus, river of the Judge, 49,
273 ; Daniel and Isaiah on, 274,
275-

El^EBIUS, 171.

Evil, what, 22; history of, 348
seq. ; the conflict with, 1 14 seq. ;
the triumph over, 136, 144, 152,
157, 160; must be destroyed,
342 seq.

F.

Faber, G. Stanley, 6, 24, 66, 477.

Fafage, glorious, shining forth,
205.

Faith, the, substance of, 29, 185,
208, 209 ; source of, 460 ; con-
firmation of, 186, 460.

Farrar, 437.

Fent-Har, the bruiser of the
Serpent, 328.

Fish, the Southern, 197; see
Piscis Australis.

Fishes, a symbol of the Church,
211 seq., 439; see Pisces.

Fishing, evangelic, 211.
Fleece, the Golden, 239, 240,
297, 330-

Gale, 396, 400, 405.
Galileo, 59, 482.
Ganymedes, the bright, the glor-
ified, the happy one, 180, 192,

193-

Gazette, Fort Wayne, on this
book, 455.

Gedi, the cut-off, the slain, 166.

Gemini, the joined, the com-
pleted, 43, 284, 290, 309.

Genesis quoted, 15, 30, 88, 145,
198, 311, 319, 340, 378,499;
the Chaldean, 24, 501.

Gentiles, believers among the,
424, 447-

Gesenius, 496.

Gianser, the punished enemy,
160.

Golden Fleece ; see Fleece.

God, existence of, 72 ; glory of,
27; willed to be known, 19;
hath spoken, 26, 423 ; forbear-
ance of, 267 ; oath of, 31 1 ;
wrath of, 352 seq.

Goodsir, 484.

Gorgons, the, 251.

Gospel, the story of, 29, 208,
460; preaching of, 199-202;
beautiful picture of, 208 ; in the
stars, questioners of, III, 458;
of dirt, 473.

Grace, heavenly, 195 ; plentiful-
ness of, 196; how carried and
administered, 204.

Grumian, the deceiver, 160.

Guardian, The, on this book,
456.

H.

Hafiz, 495.
Haggai, 77.
Hales, 496.
Harcourt, 325.

INDEX.

517

Harpocrates, victim of justice,

107.
Heaven, 151; life in, 283 seq.,

311 seq.
Heavens, the, not an unmeaning

show, 22 seq., 34; garnishing

of, 55, 497-

Hebrews, 85, 105, 109, 184, 186,
220.

Helle, 329.

Hengstenberg, 168.

Hercules, or Herakles, the suf-
fering Deliverer, 48, 130; not
understood by the Greeks, 132 ;
a picture of Christ, 133 ; most
wonderful character in myth-
ology, 134.

Hermes, 60, 76, 396.

Herodotus, 487.

Her-na, the enemy broken, 355.

Herschel, 3, 82, 486.

Hipparchus, 432, 464.

Holy Ghost, the, 193, 194;
garnished the heavens, 55, 56,
497 ; symbolized by water,

195.
Homan, the waters, 201.
Homer, 55, 126, 146, 269, 300,

486, 494.
Hornius, 400.
Horses, as symbols, 200.
Horus, the one to come, 106,

171, 291.
Humboldt, Baron, 98, 456, 470,

471.
Hydra, the abhorred, the fleeing
Serpent, 50, 53, 347, 351, 496.

I.

Idolatry, origin of, 22, 71, 490;
Jewish proneness to, 491.

Ignatius, 432.

Ignorance no argument, 462.

" Indianapolis Republican "
on this book, 457.

Infidelity, its argument from
the constellations, 67, in; ser-
vices to a better cause, 5,6, 71.

44

Infidels, how affected by this
book, 455, 458.

INGEMANN, 22.

Isaiah quoted, 66, 75, 107, 158,
193, 200, 209, 248, 266, 267,
270, 275, 278, 281, 304, 343,
344, 366.

Isocrates, 116.

Israel, twelve tribes of, 378;
segregation of, 488 ; identified
with the sign of Pisces, 439 ;
meaning of their names, 378.

Izdubar, legend of, 406.

Jason, the Recoverer, the Atoner,

the Healer, 330.
Jerusalem, the heavenly, 382;

meaning of its jewels,

383.

Jesus, the Saviour, 208; see
Christ.

Jewels in the high priest's breast-
plate, 378 seq. ; in the founda-
tions of the heavenly Jerusalem,
382 seq.

Job, 54 ; book of, 54, 327, 390,
493 ; recognizes the constella-
tions, 53, 494; asserts their di-
vine origin, 56, 497.

John quoted, 101, 105, 162, 167,
194, 211, 236, 257, 333.

Josephus, 60, 395, 405,435,436,

483.
Judgment, the, 262, 267, 283 ;

prophecies concerning, 266;

mercy in, 277, 282.
Jupiter and Saturn, 61, 434;

conjunctions of, 437.
Justification and Sanctifi cation,

95-

K.

Karch, Rev. G., his Star Bible%

505 seq.
Keckerman, 393.
Kepler, 59, 435, 437, 482.
KisSiEus, 394.

5i8

INDEX.

Knem, vanquished, conquered,

35i-

Kochab, the star, waiting the

coming, 324.
Krishna, 102, 126.

L.

Lamb, the, 43, 235; see Aries;

offices of, 236; victory of, 234;

marriage of, 295; is also the

Lion, 341.
Language, origin of, 473 seq.;

the original, 479.
Leo, the Lion, he that rends, 43,

338 ; work of, 342.
Lepus, the Hare, the mad enemy,

5o, 298.
Letronne, 479.

Leviathan, 158, 246, 247, 255.
Libra, the Scales or Balances,

price apportioned, 42, 90.
Life out of death, 162 seq., 176,

178 ; spiritual, 173.
Light, 17, 189.
Lion, the, ^8; see Leo.
Lucian, 24.

Luke quoted, 114, 185, 234,401.
Lunar Mansions, names of, 44,

366 seq.
Lunar Zodiac, 44, 364 seq.
Lyra, the Lyre or Harp, the joy

of the victory, 48, 144.

M.

Maimonides, 87, 405.

Midler, 495.

Magi, the, 25, 425 ; opinions con-
cerning their visit to Bethle-
hem, 426 ; facts and traditions,
430; following of the star,
440 ; who they were, 444 ; their
religion, 445 ; astronomically
led to Christ, 425, 503.

Man, primeval, 387, 417; best
accounts of, 392 seq. ; Bible on,
398, 475, 476 ; reason's sugges-
tions concerning, 402; a fallen
being, 76, 399.

Mansions, Lunar, 44, 364-369.

Marriage, mystery of, 198; of
the Lamb, 295.

Markab, the returning, 201.

Matar, who causeth plenteous
overflow, 201.

Matthew quoted, 25, 283, 302,
425, 503-

Mazzaroth, the twelve signs of
the Zodiac, 390, 496; Miss
Rolleston's, 7.

Medhurst, 393.

Medusa, the trodden under foot,
254; decapitated by Perseus,
25 1 ; head of, 254.

Menes, 394, 479.

Menestheus, 288.

Menkalinon, band of the goats
or ewes, 282.

Menkar, the chained enemy,
247.

Merach, the flock, 327.

Merodach, the Rectifier, the
Restorer, 291.

Merops, 180.

Messenger, The Reformed, on
this book, 455.

Messiah, the anointed, the sent,
work of, 130, 133; royal maj-
esty and glory of, 138.

Micah, 24S.

Milky Way, the, 369 ; constel-
lations on, 370 seq.

Minchir al Asad, the punish-
ing or tearing of the waster,
346.

Minchir al Gorab, the punish-
ing or tearing by the Raven,

355-
Minchir al SuGrA, punishing or

tearing of the deceivei, 351.
MiRA, the Rebel, 246.
Mirak, the weak, rhe helpless,

228.
Mirfak, who helps, who strength

ens, 250.
Mirzam, the Ruler, 302.
Mitchell, Prof., 59, 472.

INDEX.

519

Mizar, the guarded or enclosed
place, 327.

Moon, the, 44; orbit of, 16;
mansions of, 44, 364; some-
times represents the Church,
198.

MORERI, 393.

Muliphen, the leader, the chief-
tain, 302.
Mysteries, the ancient, 116.
Myths, the ethnic, 66, 508.

N.

Nature, 28, 41, 72, 189.

Nazareth, 301.

Naz-Sier, Nazir, Naz-seir-ene,
the sent Prince, 300.

Nephele, 237 seq. ; children of,
238.

Netzer, the Branch, the princely-
Scion, 301.

New Life, 174, 175, 176, 183.

Newsdealers' Bulletin on this
book, 455.

Newton, 60, 482, 486.

Nibal, the mad, 299.

Nimrod, 269, 490.

Notices of this book, 453 seq.

Nouet, 391.

O.

Oannes, 171, 172.

Ogilah, going around, Charles's
Wain, 324.

Okda, the united, 215.

Ophiuchus, the serpent-holder,
47, 124.

Origen, 483.

Orion, he who cometh forth in
brightness, the swift, the bril-
liant, 49, 268, 494 ; myths con-
cerning, 271.

Orpheus, 145 ; lyre of, 147.

P.

Patriarchs, the primeval, 33,
392 seq.; meaning of their
names, 374 seq. ; their intelli-

gence, 387 seq., 392-401, 475,

477-480, 482-486; their faith

and hopes, 187, 207, 402.
Patrick, 114.
Paul, 182; quoted, 19, 28, 34,

109, 149, 175, 198, 216, 225,

268, 311, 348, 349.
Pega, the Chief, 201.
Pegasus, 48, 199.
Pentecost, 195.
Perseus, the Breaker, 49, 229,

248; myths concerning, 250 ;

a symbol of Christ, 252.
Petavius, 508.
Phaeton, 274, 276.
Philo, 174, 389.
Pholas, mediation, 82.
Phrixus, symbol of the faithful

Church, 239.
Pietism, overdone, 459.
Pi-MENTEKON, the pourer-out of

rage, 346.
Pisces, the Fishes, 43, 214.
Piscis Australis, the Southern

Fish, 48, 197.
Planets, the wanderers, 51, 57;

conjunctions of, 434.
Plato, 392.

Pleiades, 263, 265, 495.
Plough, the, 328.
Pluche, Abbe, 115, 171, 242,

404.
Pole-Star, 322, 325.
Pollux, the Ruler, the Judge,

29o, 297, 305.
Poole, E. S., 495.
Pr;esepe, the bee-hive, the mul-
titude, offspring, the young, the
innumerable seed, 318.
Presbyterian, The, on this

book, 458.
Press, the, on this book, 453

seq.
Printers' Circular on this

book, 457.
Procyon, prince of the left hand,
redeemed or redeeming, 50,
306; myths concerning, 307.

520

INDEX.

" Prophetic Times " on this

book, 454.
Prophets, the primeval, 398,

400-410, 421, 424, 489; the

Hebrew, 488, 491, 499.
Psalms quoted, 27, 102, 114,

117, 138, 145, 158, 245, 258,

275, 278, 281, 284, 302, 306,

340, 344, 346, 352.
Ptolemy, 132, 391, 432, 464,

466.
Pyramid, the great, 5, 58, ^ZZ,

484 seq.
Pythagoras, 482.

R.

Rakis, the bound, the caught,
299.

Ram, or Lamb, 535 ; see Aries ;
feasts of the, 240, 241.

Ras al Gethi, head of Him
who bruises, 130.

Ras al Thalitha, head of the
height, 235.

Rastaban, head of the subtle,
160.

Rationalism, 459, 460.

Raven, 354 ; see Corvus.

Redemption, 90 seq. ; price of,
98 seq., 104.

Reem, the, 259, 262 ; see Taurus.

Resurrection, 172, 182, 184,
187, 234, 295, 313, 315, 371.

Revelation, 26, 69, 72, 460;
the primitive, 27, 489; perver-
sions of, 70, 490; proven by
the myths of the constellations,
26, 69.

Riccioli, 59.

Richer, 23.

Rigel, or Regel, Regulus, the
foot that crushes, 270, 346.

Roberts, 23.

Rod, Jacob's, in Orion, 270.

ROLLESTON, Miss, 7, 26, 324.
ROSENMULLER, 496.

Rosh Satan, head of the evil
one, 254.

Royer, celestial chart of, 465,
467, 470.

Ruchbah, the seated, the en-
throned, 244.

S.

Sa'ad al Bula, witness of the
rising or drinking in, 368.

Sa'ad al Melik, witness or
record of the outpouring, 194.

Sa'ad al Su'ud, witness of the
swimming or outpouring, 368.

Sabaism, 71, 490.

Sabbath, the, 60; final, 294.

Sadr, who returns as in a cir-
cle, 205.

Sagitta, the killing arrow, 48,
176.

Sagittarius, the Bowman, 42,
140.

St. Sophia, church of, 70.

Saints, the, 309 ; rapture of, 371 ;
in heaven, 333.

Sanctification and justification,

95 seq-

Satan, 29, 123, 347; career of,
355 ; end of, 357.

Saviour, the, 88; see under each
constellation.

Scales, or Balances, 91 ; see Li-
bra.

SCALIGER, 508.

Scarab.eus, the, a symbol of the
history and experiences of the
Church, 314.

Scheat, who goes and returns,
20.

Science, astronomical, 15, 32, 34,
36, 38, 41, 58, 362, 388 ; of the
early patriarchs, 392 seq., 482 ;
modern achievements of, 420;
recent discoveries of, 478; at
fault in explaining the constel-
lations, 4, 385 ; facts of, 480 ;
this book not in conflict with
true, 481 seq.

Scorpio, the Scorpion, the great
conflict, 42, 114, 495.

INDEX.

521

Serak, conquering, victorious,

306.
Sera, victory by great conflict,

467.
Sephina, multitudinous good,

322.
Serpent, the, 29, 47, 121, 122,

348 ; career of, 354 seq.
Serpentarius, 127.
Seth, 374, 394, 4§3> 489.
Seyffarth, Dr., 59, 63, 391,

472, 478.
Shakespeare, 78.
Shedar, the freed, 243.
Shes-en-fent, rejoicing over the

serpent, 332.
Sign, what, 20.
Signs, heavenly bodies created

for, 21, 499; of the Zodiac, 42,

43; of the other constellations,

47-51; order of, 162, 261, 413

seq.
Simak AL Azel, Branch of the

power of God, 366.
Sin, 94, 95 , forgiveness of, 94

seq.
SlRiUS, the Prince, the Guardian,

the Victorious, 17, 50, 299;

companion of, 305.
Smith and Sayce, 24, 131, 407,

501.
Soheil, what was desired, 332.

SOUTHEY, 45.

Speculation, the charge of, 111.

Spica, the seed of wheat, 74,
164.

" Standard," The Chicago, on
this book, 457.

Star-Bible, 505.

Star-chart, 38, n.

Star-groups, 33 ; see Constella-
tions ; figures of, 36; the orig-
inal forty-eight, 39, 64.

Star of Bethlehem, 424 seq. ;
the following of, 440.

Stars, distances of, 17; as signs,
20 ; how made to speak, 32 ;
record of, 410, 449.

44*

Stoddart's Review 011 this
book, 353.

Stones, precious, made to ex-
press redemption, 383.

Subilon, the ear of wheat, 75.

Sugia, the deceiver, 299.

Sun, the, 15, 17; notation of,
among the planets, 61, 481 ; a
picture of, 302.

Superstition, generally has
started from some truth, 22.

Swan, the, 203 ; see Cygnus.

T.

Tarared, wounded, torn, 180.

Taurus, the Bull, the Head, Cap-
tain, mighty Chieftain who
cometh, 43, 259, 263, 495;
myths concerning, 264.

Tav, or Tau, the Cross, symbol
of life, 92, 100, 102.

Testament, the New, witnesses
to the Gospel in the stars, 25,
424 seq., 503.

Thales, 55.

Theories of the constellations,
3, 115,409,457.

Thuban, the subtle, 159.

Toliman, the heretofore and the
hereafter. 82.

Triumph, the price of, 136.

Tureis, the firm possession in
hand, 332.

Typhon, or Python, 1 1 9, 1 98, 2 1 5.

U.

Ugubinus, 397.

Ulugh Beigh, 7, 82, 84, 106,
467.

Umbreit, 496.

Under-world, the, 151.

Unicorn, or Reem, 259; de-
scribed by Caesar, 260; Job on,
260 ; Moses on, 260 ; Isaiah on,
266.

Union, the mystical, 168.

Universe, vastness of, 17 ; centre
of, 18, 495.

522

INDEX.

Ursa Major, the Great Bear,
properly the greater sheepfold,

5°, 327-
Ursa Minor, the Lesser Bear,

or sheepfold, 50, 322.
" Utica Herald" on this book,

457-

V.

Vega, he shall be exalted, the war-
rior triumphant, victory, 149.

Vendidad, the, on the first man,
393.

Ventura, 470.

Victim, the, 104.

Victory, the final, 336.

Virgil, 89, 300.

Virgin, seed of the, 72, 74.

Virgo, the Virgin, 42, 71 seq., 85.

Vishnu, 143.

Volney, 5, 67, 68, 412.

W.

Wassat, set, seated, put in place,
291.

Water, the beauty of, 189; sym-
bolizes saving grace, 195.

Waterman, the, 192; see Aqua-
rius.

Waters, the living, 189 seq.

Week, days of, whence named,
61.

Weemes, John, 475.

Wesen, shining, illustrious, scar

let, 302.
Wisdom, the secrets of, 361.
Woman, the, her creation, 198;

represents the Church, 198;

seed of, 3, 66, 120.
Wordsworth, 164.
Writing, origin of, 473.

Y.

Yao, reign of, in China, 364.
Yima, 393.

Zechariah quoted, 200, 224,
303-

Zodiac, the, 41 ; signs of, 42 ; in
the Chaldean tablets, 406 seq. ;
age of, 58-63, 364-366, 387-
404, 479, 482, 483 ; Persian,
332; of Dendera, 7, ioi, 151,
224, 282, 289, 300, 328, 332,
351 ; of Esne, 7, 71 ; lunar,

44, 57, 364, 366-

Zoroaster, 406, 445.

Zosma, the shining forth, 346.

Zuben Akrabi, the price of con-
flict, 93.

Zuben al Shemali, the price
which covers, 93

THE END.

Date Due

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