... The modern philosopher and historian alike deride and marvel at astrology as the most persistent disease with which the minds of men have ever been afflicted but from which they are now happily freed by the advance of science. I must confess my inability to share this view as to the patent folly of the art. The careful student of astrology cannot fail to be impressed with the logical coherence of its doctrines and their necessary relation to the fundamental postulates from which they spring. While these postulates can no longer be maintained they seem in no way inappropriate as stages in the development of human knowledge and their wide spread acceptance is sufficient evidence of their seeming reasonableness to nascent society. Indeed it is only the upper strata of European civilization that has now outgrown the beliefs above considered. Asia still teems with them, from Seoul to Bagdad, and even in the heart of Europe astrological calendars are current and find enormous circulation among the lower classes. The practicing astrologer who seeks business through advertising in the daily press is with us in America, and to judge by the persistence of his advertisements they bring response. I find upon the shelves of the principal scientific library of Chicago a manual of applied astrology whose dirty and dog's eared leaves, together with recent date upon its title page, are additional testimony that American cultivation of the occult is not limited to Boston. Even nearer home we all know people who will plant or sow, or cut their hair only at the right phase of the moon or who have an abiding faith that the planetary weather predictions of Mr. Hicks are sound, in theory at least. I venture to assert that within range of the reader's acquaintance there is a considerable number of persons who firmly believe that in case of premature birth a seven months baby has a better chance of life than one of eight months--an ancient doctrine, for which excellent reasons were adduced by the Greek astrologers but which seems to find little support in current medical theory.