Again, should the ruling places be situated in tropical or in equinoctial signs, in either case alike they presignify changes in the state of the atmosphere, at the respective season to which each sign is appropriated. For example, with regard to the season of spring and the productions of the earth, if the said places should be in the sign of the vernal equinox, they will produce an effect on the buds of the vine and fig, and of such other trees as sprout forth at that season. Should they be in the sign of the summer tropic, the event will affect the gathering and depositing of fruits; and, with respect to Ægypt in particular, it will impede the rising of the Nile. If they should be in the sign of the autumnal equinox, they foreshow that it will operate on grain and on various sorts of herbs; if in the sign of the winter tropic, on potherbs, esculent vegetables, and such birds and fishes as arrive in that season. The equinoctial signs further indicate the circumstances liable to happen in ecclesiastical concerns, and in religious matters: the tropical signs give warning of changes in the atmosphere and in political affairs; the fixed signs, of changes in institutions and in buildings; and the bicorporeal signs show that the future event will fall alike on princes and their subjects. Again, the ruling places situated in the east, during the time of the eclipse, signify that fruits and seeds, incipient institutions, and the age of youth, will be affected; those, which may be in the mid-heaven above the earth announce that the coming event will relate to ecclesiastical affairs, to kings and princes, and to the middle age; those in the west, that it will influence the laws, old age, and persons about to die. The proportion liable to be affected, of that genus or kind on which the event will fall, is to be ascertained by the magnitude of the obscuration caused by the eclipse, and by the positions held by the operative stars in regard to the ecliptical place; as, in vespertine position to a solar eclipse, or in matutine position to a lunar eclipse, the said stars will most usually much diminish the effect; in opposition they render it moderate; but in matutine position to a solar eclipse, or in vespertine to a lunar, they greatly augment and extend it.[94] [93] It is perhaps unnecessary to remark, that, in speaking of ruling places, as liable to be situated in Aquila, Delphinus or Argo, Ptolemy alludes only to the places of the fixed stars in dominion: since the ecliptical place and the planets must be confined to the zodiacal signs.