Marcus Tullius Cicero (Arpino 106 BCE- Formia 43 BCE)

good sense:
- Etenim ad aegros non vates aut hariolos, sed medicos solemus adducere;
In fact usually at the bedside of the patients we lead doctors, and not fortune tellers or charlatans;

let's be modern, come on!:
- Haec iam, mihi crede, ne aniculae quidem existimans. (II, 36)
Neither the old women, believe me, give faith to these things anymore ...

does it remind you somebody?:
- Vetus autem illud Catonis admodum scitum est, qui mirari se aiebat, quod non rideret haruspex, haruspicem cum vidisset. (II, 51)
It is well known then the old saying of Cato, who said he was astonished that when two haruspices (soothsayers) met one other did not burst into laughter.

if you really want to believe it...:
- Iam vero coniectura omnis, in qua nititur divinatio, ingeniis hominum in multas aut diversas aut etiam contrarias partis saepe diducitur. Ut enim in causis iudicialibus alia coniectura est accusatoris, alia defensoris et tamen utriusque credibilis, sic in omnibus iis rebus quae coniectura investigari videntur anceps reperitur oratio. (II, 55)
In fact every prediction on which the divination is based, often is stretched by the human mind in many various and sometimes opposite directions. In fact, as in a trial before the court the prosecutor supports a thesis and the defender another one, and still they are both credible, therefore in all those things that seems to have to be inquired with predictions, you find ambiguous affirmations.

the virgin Mary weeps:
- Sanguine pluisse senatui nuntiatum est, Atratum etiam fluvium fluxisse sanguine, deorum sudasse simulacra. (...) Nec enim sanguis nec sudor nisi e corpore. Sed et decolaratio quaedam ex aliqua contagione terrena maxume potest sanguini similis esse, et umor adlapsus extrinsecus, ut in tectoriis videmus austro, sudorem videtur imitari. (II, 58)
It was announced in the Senate that it had rained blood, and also that in the Atratus river the blood had ran and that the statues of the gods had sweated. (...) But neither blood neither sweat goes out if not from a body. But the change of color for the contact with the soil can easily look like blood, and the humidity infiltrated from the outside, that we see in the plasters exposed to south, seems to imitate the sweat.

"But, if everybody believies it! ...":
- "At omnes reges, populi, nationes utuntur auspiciis." Quasi vero quicquam sit tam valde quam nihil sapere vulgare, aut quasi tibi ipsi in iudicando placeat multitudo! (II, 81)
(You say) that all the kings, the people, the nations believe to the predictions, like if there was something so common like the ignorance, and like if yourself in your judgments would treat with respect the opinion of the mob.

was he better than Nostradamus?:
- De quibus Eudoxus, Platonis auditor, in astrologia iudicio doctissimorum hominum facile princeps, sic opinatur, id quod scriptum reliquit, Chaldaeis in praedictione et in notatione cuiusque vitae ex natali die minime esse credendum (II, 87)
The famous Eudoxus, disciple of Plato, considered by far the greatest of the astronomers, by the judgment of the wisest men, thought, and this remains still written, that it absolutely must not believe to the astrologers on the prediction and the description of the life of everyone based on the birth day.

horoscopes:
- Quid? quod uno et eodem temporis puncto nati dissimilis et naturas et vitas et casus habent, parumne declarat nihil ad agendam vitam nascendi tempus pertinere? Nisi forte putamus neminem eodem temporem ipso et conceptum et natum, quo Africanum. Num quis igitur talis fuit? (II, 95)
More? since the people born exactly in the same moment have various nature, lifes and vicissitudes, does not this mean perhaps that the moment of the birth has nothing to deal with what it happens in the life? Unless we think that nobody has been conceived or was born in the same moment of Scipio the African. Who in fact has ever been equal to him?

the matter is closed:
- Sed quid plura? Cotidie refelluntur. Quam multa ego Pompeio, quam multa Crasso, quam multa huic ipsi Caesari a Chaldaeis dicta memini, neminem eorum nisi senectute, nisi domi, nisi cum claritate esse moriturum! Ut mihi permirum videatur quemquam exstare qui etiam nunc credat iis quorum praedicta cotidie videat re et eventis refelli. (II, 99)
But is there need to say other? Every day (the prophecies) are belied. I remember many of them, made by astrologers to Pompeius, many others to Crassus, many to the same Cesar: nobody of them would have to die if not at an old age, if not in its bed, if not covered with glory. So I find very strange that someone still believes to those whose forecasts are every day belied by the facts and the events.

selection of the outcomes:
- Adsumit autem Cratippus hoc modo: "Sunt autem innumerabiles praesensiones non fortuitae". At ego dico nullam (...) Quid est perspicuum? "Multa vera" inquit "evadere". Quid quod multo plura falsa? Nonne ipsa varietas, quae est propria fortunae, fortunam esse causam, non naturam esse docet? (II, 109)
Cratippus asserts in fact: "there are countless not accidental omens". And I say that there's noone (...) is there something evident? "Many omens come true". And those, much more numerous, that turn out wrong? And just this variability, that is typical of the hazard, does not say perhaps that they are caused by the chance and not by the nature?

an old trick:
- Callide enim, qui illa composuit, perfecit ut, quodcumque accidisset, praedicturum videretur, hominum et temporum definitione sublata. Adhibuit etiam latebram obscuritatis, ut iidem versus alias in aliam rem posse accommodari viderentur. (II, 110-111)
Who composed (that prophecy) made it slyly so that, having neglected to specify the persons and the times, every thing that happened, seemed to fulfil the prophecy. He used also the subterfuge of the obscurity of the terms, so that the same line could be adapted either to one or the other fact, according to the circumstances.

probability:
- Iam ex insanorum aut ebriorum visis innumerabilia coniectura trahi possumus, quae futura videantur. Quis est enim, qui totum diem iaculans non aliquando conliniet? Totas noctes somniamus, neque ulla est fere, qua non dormiamus; et miramur aliquando id quod somniarimus evadere? Quid est tam incertum quam talorum iactus? Tamen nemo est quin saepe iactans Venerium iaciat aliquando, non numquam etiam iterum ac tertium. (II, 121)
Surely from the visions of the insanes and of the drunkards we can draw predictions that can be fulfilled in the future. Who, in fact, shooting arrows all the day will not hit some time the mark? We dream all the nights and there's almost no night in which we do not sleep, and are we surprised if sometimes what we dream comes true? What's more uncertain than playing dice? Nevertheless all those who try often their luck get the "Venus shot" at least once in a while, sometimes even two or three times.

- Nunc illa testabor, non me sortilegos neque eos, qui quaestus causa hariolentur, ne psychomantia quidem (...) agnoscere; non habeo denique nauci Marsum augurem, non vicanos haruspices, non de circo astrologos, non Isiacos coniectores, non interpretes somniorum; non enim sunt ii aut scientia aut arte divini, sed

Now I will declare not to recognize those who foresee the future, those who make prophecies for money, not even those that conjure up the dead; (...) and neither are worth a fig the Augurs of the land of the Marsi people, or the street haruspices (soothsayers), or the circus astrologers, the fortune tellers of Isis, the dreams' interpreters; they in fact are not fortune tellers by science or art, but: "superstitious prophets and impudent fortune tellers, bunglers or fools or driven by the poverty, which are unable to follow their own path and show the way to the others; they promise treasures to the same they ask for coins: they'd better take their coins from those treasures and give back the remainder"
so the famous Ennius said...

- Etenim ad aegros non vates aut hariolos, sed medicos solemus adducere; nec vero qui fidibus aut tibiisuti volunt ab haruspicibus accipiunt earum tractationem, sed a musicis. 10 Eadem in litteris ratio est reliquisque rebus, quarum est disciplina. Num censes eos, qui divinare dicuntur, posse respondere, sol maiorne quam terra sit an tantus quantus videatur, lunaque suo lumine an solis utatur? sol, luna quem motum habeat? quem quinque stellae, quae errare dicuntur? Nec haec qui divini habentur profitentur se esse dicturos, nec eorum, quae in geometria describuntur, quae vera, quae falsa sint: sunt enim ea mathematicorum, non hariolorum. De illis vero rebus quae in philosophia versantur, num quid est quod quisquam divinorum aut respondere soleat aut consuli quid bonum sit, quid malum, quid neutrum? Sunt enim haec propria philosophorum. 11 Quid? de officio num quis haruspicem consulit quem ad modum sit cum parentibus, cum fratribus, cum amicis vivendum, quem ad modum utendum pecunia, quem ad modum honore, quem ad modum imperio? Ad sapientes haec, non ad divinos referri solent. Quid? quae a dialecticis aut physicis tractantur, num quid eorum divinari potest, unusne mundus sit an plures, quae sint initia rerum, ex quibus nascuntur omnia? Physicorum est ista prudentia (...) Quid? cum quaeritur qui sit optimus rei publicae status, quae leges, qui mores aut utiles aut inutiles, haruspicesne ex Etruria arcessentur, an principes statuent et delecti viri periti rerum civilium? 12 Quodsi nec earum rerum, quae subiectae sensibus sunt, ulla divinatio est nec earum, quae artibus continentur, nec earum, quae in philosophia disserentur, nec earum, quae in re publica versantur, quarum rerum sit nihil prorsum intellego. Nam aut omnium debet esse, aut aliqua ei materia danda est in qua versari possit. Sed nec omnium divinatio est, ut ratio docuit, nec locus nec materia invenitur, cui divinationem praeficere possimus. Vide igitur, ne nulla sit divinatio. Est quidam Graecus vulgaris in hanc sententiam versus: "Bene quí coniciet, vátem hunc perhibebo óptumum." Num igitur aut, quae tempestas impendeat, vates melius coniciet quam gubernator, aut morbi naturam acutius quam medicus, aut belli administrationem prudentius quam imperator coniectura adsequetur. (II, 9-12)

In fact usually at the bedside of the patients we lead doctors, and not fortune tellers or charlatans; and indeed who wants to learn to play the cithara or the flute will learn from a musicians rather than from an haruspex. 10 the same thing happens in the field of Arts and other matters that are taught. And do you really think perhaps that those which are called fortune tellers can answer if you ask them if the sun is bigger than earth or is as big as it appears? or if the moon shines with its own light or if it takes its light from the sun? or on which it is the motion of the sun and the moon? or on which it is the motion of the five stars that are called "wandering"? And those who are considered fortune tellers don't assert to know how to answer neither on these things, neither on which of the definitions of geometry are true and which are false: in fact these are things for mathematicians, not for charlatans. And on the issues regarding philosophy, isn't maybe there one to which somebody of the fortune tellers answers or is consulted on what is good, what is bad and what is neutral? In fact these are things of competence of the philosophers. 11 More? Who ever consults a haruspex on a task to perform, on how to live well with the parents, the brothers or the friends, on how to invest money, on how to be in a public or military office? For these things one addresses the wise, rather than the fortune tellers. What more? About the matters dealt by the dialecticians or by the naturalists, who of the fortune tellers can say if there is a single world or there are multifarious ones, and which are the principles from which all the things have origin? This is of competence of the physicists (...) More? When we ask ourselves which is the best organization of the State, and which laws and which customs are useful or useless, we ever send for haruspices from Etruria, or we let the notables and the best statesmen to decide? 12 Because, if there is neither a skill to foretell the things perceived by the senses, nor those founded on a science, nor those discussed in philosophy, nor those the politics deal of, with what the divination deals I really don't understand. In fact, it should concern with every issue or there should be some field of which it could deal. But the divination neither concerns with every issue, how the reasoning showed us, nor has been found one field or one matter to assign to the divination. Then you can judge by yourself if maybe the divination does not exist at all. There is a common Greek saying that recites: "The one who foretells right, I will cite as the best fortune teller". Therefore the fortune teller should foresee the coming of the storm better than the helmsman, or the nature of the disease with more sharpness than the doctor, or will make conjectures on how to lead the war better than the commander?

What's Your Zodiac Sign?:
- 89 Sic isti disputant qui haec Chaldaeorum natalicia predicta defendunt: vim quandam esse aiunt signifero in orbe, qui Graece zwdiakóV dicitur, talem ut eius orbis una quaeque pars alia alio modo moveat immutetque caelum, perinde ut quaeque stellae in his finitumisque partibus sint quoque tempore, eamque vim varie moveri ab iis sideribus quae vocentur errantia; cum autem in eam ipsam partem orbis venerint, in qua sit ortus eius qui nascatur, aut in eam quae coniunctum aliquid habeat aut consentiens, ea triangula illi et quadrata nominant. Etenimcum tempore anni tempestatumque caeli conversiones commutationesque tantae fiant accessu stellarum et recessu, cumque ea vi solis efficiantur quae videmus, non veri simile solum, sed etiam verum esse censent, perinde utcumque temperatus sit aër, ita pueros orientis animari atque formari, ex eoque ingenia, mores, animum, corpus, actionem vitae, casus cuiusque eventusque fingi.

89 Those who defend Chaldeans' predictions on birth day maintain that in the starry circle, that the Greeks call Zodiac, acts a force so made that, they say, every part of the same circle moves and changes the sky in various way, according to which stars lie in that part in that moment; that same force is modified by the stars that are called wandering; when the stars arrive in that part of the sky under which a child is born, or in an other one somehow similar or concordant with it, they call those figures triangles and squares. In fact, since with the change of seasons and meteorological conditions during the year, for the approach and the removal of stars many mutations and alterations happen, and since these changes are provoked by the action of the sun, they think not only reasonable, but quite true that, according to how the air is regulated, a temperament and a constitution are given to the children who are born, and that, starting from this, all the qualities, the character, the physique, the facts of the life, the cases and the events of everyone are formed.

90 O delirationem incredibilem! (Non enim omnia error stultitia dicenda est). Quibus etiam Diogenes Stoicus concedit aliquid, ut praedicere possint dumtaxat qualis quisque natura et ad quam quisque maxume rem aptus futurus sit; cetera quae profiteantur negat ullo modo posse sciri; etenim geminorum formas esse similis, vitam atque fortunam plerumque disparem. Procles et Eurysthenes, Lacedaemoniorum reges, gemini fratres fuerunt; at ii nec totidem annos vixerunt (anno enim Procli vita brevior fuit), multumque is fratri rerum gestarum gloria praestitit. (...)

90 Oh incredible raving! (in fact not always the errors can be called nonsense). Even Diogenes the Stoic grants something to them, that is they can only foretell the nature of everyone and which activity will be more suitable, and denies that in any way they can know the other things that they assert to know: in fact the twins have a similar aspect, but different kinds of lifes and destinies. Procles and Eurysthenes, kings of Sparta, were twins, but they did not live the same number of years, since Procles died one year before and had from its enterprises much more glory thanhis brother.

91 Etenim cum, ut ipsi dicunt, ortus nascentium luna moderetur, eaque animadevertant et notent sidera natalicia Chaldaei, quaecumque lunae iuncta videantur, oculorum fallacissimo sensu iudicant ea quae ratione atque animo videre debebant. Docet enim ratio mathematicorum, quam istis notam esse oportebat, quanta humilitate luna feratur terram paene contingens, quantum absit a proxuma Mercuri stella, multo autemlongius a Veneris, deinde alio intervallo distet a sole, cuius lumine conlustrari putatur; reliqua vero tria intervalla infinita et immensa, a sole ad Martis, inde ad Iovis, ab eo ad Saturni stellam; inde ad caelum ipsum, quod extremum atque ultumum mundi est.

91 But I instead deny that could be known what the excellent Diogenes grants to the astrologers, as for a kind of collusion with them. In fact since, as they say, the moon influences the birth of the children, and they observe and annotate at the birth which stars seem in conjunction with the moon, what would have to be seen with the reason and the mind, they judge instead with the most deceptive sense of the sight. In fact the science of the mathematicians, that would be well known by them, teaches us that the Moon passes at a short distance from the earth, until nearly touching it, and teaches how far is it from Mercury, the nearer star, and even more from Venus, and that an other interval separates it from the Sun, from whose light is thought it is illuminated; the others three intervals are indeed immense and infinites: from the Sun to Mars, then to Jupiter, from Jupiter to the star Saturn and then until the same vault of heaven, that it is the extreme and last border of the Universe.

92 Quae potest igitur contagio ex infinito paene intervallo pertinere ad lunam vel potius ad terram?
Quid? Cum dicunt, id quod iis dicere necesse est, omnis omnium ortus quicumque gignantur in omni terra quae incolatur, eosdem esse, eademque omnibus qui eodem statu caeli et stellarum nati sint accidere necesse est, nonne eius modi sunt, ut ne caeli quidem naturam interpretes istos caeli nosse appareat? Cum enim illi orbes, qui caelum quasi medium dividunt et aspectum nostrum definiunt (qui a Graecis órìzonteV nominantur, a nobis "finientes" rectissume nominari possunt) varietatem maxumam habeant aliique in aliis locis sint, necesse est ortus occasusque siderum non fieri eodem tempore apud omnis.

92 Which influence can therefore be exercised from an infinite space towards the Moon or even the earth? What more? When they say, and they're forced to say it, that all the births of all those generated in every inhabited country are the same ones, and that to those who are born under the same sky and stars disposition must inevitably happen the same things, don't they maybe show they don't know the very nature of the sky, of which they would have to be interpreters? In fact, since these circles which divide the sky more or less into halves and delimit our visual (and that the Greeks call "orizontes", and that we can more correctly call "delimiting") have the maximum variety and are various in various places, it follows that the rising and setting of stars doesn't occurr at the same time in every place.

93 Quodsi eorum vi caelum modo hoc, modo illo modo temperatur, qui potest eadem vis esse nascentium, cum caeli tanta sit dissimilitudo? In his locis quae nos incolimus post solstitium Canicula exoritur, et quidem aliquot diebus; at apud Trogodytas, ut scribitur, ante solstitium; ut, si iam concedamus aliquid vim caelestem ad eos qui in terra gignuntur pertinere, confitendum sit illis eos qui nascuntur eodem tempore posse in dissimilis incidere naturas propter caeli dissimilitudinem; quod minime illis placet; volunt enim illi omnis eodem tempore ortos, qui ubiquesint nati, eadem condicione nasci.

93 And if for their influence the sky is regulated in one or another way, how can it be an equal influence on those who are born, if in the sky there is so much difference? In the places in which we live, Sirius rises after the summer solstice, or even several days later, while by the Troglodytes, as it can be read, it rises before the solstice; therefore, if even we admit that some heavenly influence acts on those who are generated on earth, we would admit that those who are born in the same period can have different natures because of the diversities of the sky, but the astrologers don't admit this at all: they assert in fact that all those born in the same period, wherever they are born, are born in the same condition.

94 Sed quae tanta dementia est, ut in maxumis motibus mutationibusque caeli nihil intersit qui ventus, qui imber, quae tempestas ubisque sit? Quarum rerum in proxumis locis tantae dissimilitudines saepe sunt, ut alia Tusculi, alia Romae eveniat saepe tempestas; quod qui navigant maxume animadvertunt, cum in flectendis promunturiis ventorum mutationes maxumas saepe sentiunt. Haec igitur cum sit tum serenitas, tum perturbatio caeli, estne sanorum hominum hoc ad nascentium ortus pertinere non dicere (quod non certe pertinet), illud nescio quid tenue, quod sentiri nullo modo, intellegi autem vix potest, quae a luna ceterisque sideribus caeli temperatio fiat, dicere ad puerorum ortus pertinere?
Quid? Quod non intellegunt seminum vim, quae ad gignendum procreandumque plurimum valeat, funditus tolli, mediocris erroris est? Quid enim non videt et formas et mores et plerosque status ac motus effingere a parentibus liberos? Quod non contingeret, si haec non vis et natura gignentium efficeret, sed temperatio lunae caelique moderatio.

94 But what a madness is this, for which, with the great sky movements and mutations, the wind, the rain, the season of every place don't have any influence? These factors are often very different even between near places, so that often the weather conditions in Tusculus are different from those of Rome; the sailors know very well this, when doubling a cape, often notice great changes of the wind. Therefore, inasmuch as the sky is sometimes serene, sometimes stormy, is maybe sane who says that this doesn't influence the birth of the children (and in effects it doesn't the influence), asserting in the same time that the birth is influenced by a slender certain something, that in no way can be perceived, and hardly can be understood, that is a conditioning of the moon and the other stars? What more? Who doesn't understand that it's not a weak error to fully neglect the importance of the ancestors, who have a basic importance in generation and procreation? In fact, who doesn't notice that the sons take from the parents the appearance, the character, and the greater part of the body attitudes, both in motion and at rest? This you would not happen if they were the moon influence and the sky disposition to act, rather than the influence and the nature of those who generate.

95 Quid? quod uno et eodem temporis puncto nati dissimilis et naturas et vitas et casus habent, parumne declarat nihil ad agendam vitam nascendi tempus pertinere? Nisi forte putamus neminem eodem temporem ipso et conceptum et natum, quo Africanum. Num quis igitur talis fuit?

95 More? since the people born exactly in the same moment have various nature, lifes and vicissitudes, does not this mean perhaps that the moment of the birth has nothing to deal with what it happens in the life? Unless we think that nobody has been conceived or was born in the same moment of Scipio the African. Who in fact has ever been equal to him?

96 Quid? Illudne dubium est quin multi, cum ita nati essent ut quaedam contra naturam depravata haberent, restituerentur et corrigerentur ab Natura, cum se ipsa revocasset, aut arte atque medicina? Ut, quorum linguae sic inhaererent, ut loqui non possent, eae scalpello resectae liberarentur. Multi etiam naturae vitium meditatione atque exercitatione sustulerunt, ut Demosthenem scribit Phalereus, cum rho dicere nequiret, exercitatione fecisse ut planissume diceret. Quodsi haec astro ingenerata et tradita essent, nulla res ea mutare posset. Quid? Dissimilitudo locorum nonne dissimiles homines procreationem habet? Quas quidem percurrere oratione facile est, quid inter Indos et persas, Aethiopas et Syros differat corporibus, animis, ut incredibilis varietas dissimilitudoque sit.

96 More? Is there any doubt that many, born with defects and physical anomalies, have been rehabilitated or corrected by the Nature, that amended itself, or from the surgery or the medicine? Like those who had their tongue adherent to the palate, so that they weren't able to speak, and have been freed by the incision of the surgeon? And many others corrected a defect of nature with the meditation and the exercise, as Phalereus writes of Demosthenes, who couldn't say the "ar", and trained himself so much that succeeded to pronounce it very well. If all those defects had been caused and transmitted by the stars, nothing could correct them. What more? Different places do not maybe generate different men? Of this it is easy to make examples, saying of how incredibly are different and vary the Indians from the Persians and the Ethiopians from the Syrians, both for look and character.

97 Ex quo intellegitur plus terrarum situs quam lunae tactus ad nascendum valere. Nam quod aiunt quadringenta septuaginta milia annorum in periclitandis experiundisque pueris, quicumque essent nati, Babylonios posuisse fallunt: si enim esset factitatum, non esset desitum; neminem autem habemus auctorem, qui id aut fieri dicat aut factum sciat.(...) Ego autem etiam haec requiro, omnesne, qui Cannensi pugna ceciderint, uno astro fuerint; exitus quidem omnium unus et idem fuit. Quid? Qui ingenio atque animo singulares, num astro quoque uno? Quod enim tempus quo non innumerabiles nascuntur? At certe similis nemo Homeri.

97 From that we understand that, on the birth, the place on earth has more influence than the moon touch. In fact are wrong all those who say that the Babylonian tried and tested the children for 470,000 years, in every time they were born: in fact, if they really had estimated this again and again, they wouldn't have stopped; of the other hand there's no author who tells us that it really happened or who knows the fact (...) But then I ask myself if all those who died in the Cannae battle were born under the same star, inasmuch as the fate was for all them the same. What more? Those who are exceptional for talent and spirit, perhaps were all born under the same star? In which period countless children are not born? Nevertheless nobody has ever been close to Homer.

98 Et, si ad rem pertinet quo modo caelo adfecto compositisque sideribus quodque animal oriatur, valeat id necesse est non in hominibus solum, verum in bestiis etiam; quo quid potest dici absurdius? L. quidem Tarutius Firmanus, familiaris noster, in primis Chaldaeicis rationibus eruditus, urbis etiam nostrae natalem diem repetebat ab iis Parilibus, quibus eam a Romulo conditam accepimus, Romamque, in iugo cum esset luna, natam esse dicebat, nec eius fata canere dubitabat. 99 O vim maxumam erroris! Etiamne urbis natalis dies ad vim stellarum et lunae pertineret? Fac in puero referre ex qua adfectione caeli primum spiritum duxerit; num hoc in latere aut in caemento, ex quibus urbs effecta est, potuit valere? (II, 89-99)

98 but if it is important how the sky is arranged and how the stars are ordered when a living being is born, this has to be sound not only for the humans, but also for the beasts: but which more absurd thing could be said?
Lucius Tarutius from Fermo, a dearest friend of ours, very good expert of astrology, led back the day of birth of our city to the Paliliae festivities, during which we think that it has been founded by Romulus, and said that Rome was founded while the Moon was in Libra, and did not hesitate to sing of its fates. 99 Oh, enormous power of the error! Is even the day of birth of a city influenced by the stars and the Moon? If we also admit that for a child it can be important under which conformation of the sky has taken the first breath, can this also be true for the stones or the concrete of which a city is made?

   page last updated: November 10th 2007