"When all looks fair about," says Sir Thomas Browne, "and thou seest not a cloud so big as a hand to threaten thee, forget not the wheel of things; think of sudden, vicissitudes, but beat not thy brains to foreknow them." It was characteristic of an age of luxury that it should be one of superstition and mental disquietude, eager to penetrate the future, and credulous in its belief of those who pretended to unveil its secrets. In such an age astrology naturally found many dupes. Rome was infested with professors of that so-called science, who had flocked thither from the East, and were always ready, like other oracles, to supply responses acceptable to their votaries. In what contempt Horace held their prognostications the following Ode (I. 11) very clearly indicates. The women of Rome, according to Juvenal, were great believers in astrology, and carried manuals of it on their persons, which they consulted before they took an airing or broke their fast. Possibly on this account Horace addressed the ode to a lady. But in such things, and not under the Roman Empire only, there have always been, as La Fontaine says, "_bon nombre d'hommes qui sont femmes_." If Augustus, and his great general and statesman Agrippa, had a Theogenes to forecast their fortunes, so the first Napoleon had his Madame Lenormand. "Ask not--such lore's forbidden-- What destined term may be Within the future hidden For us, Leuconöe. Both thou and I Must quickly die! Content thee, then, nor madly hope To wrest a false assurance from Chaldean horoscope. "Far nobler, better were it, Whate'er may be in store, With soul serene to bear it, If winters many more Jove spare for thee, Or this shall be The last, that now with sullen roar Scatters the Tuscan surge in foam upon the rock-bound shore. "Be wise, your spirit firing With cups of tempered wine, And hopes afar aspiring In compass brief confine, Use all life's powers; The envious hours Fly as we talk; then live to-day, Nor fondly to to-morrow trust more than you must or may."