This
connection between medicine and astrology survives in the sign of
Jupiter 4, which still heads medicinal prescriptions.] and that by
casting "horoscopes," showing just how the stars appeared at the birth
of any person, the subsequent career of such an one might be foreseen.
Many silly notions and superstitions grew up about astrology, yet the
practice persisted. Charles V and Francis I, great rivals in war, vied
with each other in securing the services of most eminent astrologers,
and Catherine de' Medici never tired of reading horoscopes.
[Sidenote: "The Ptolemaic System"]
Throughout the middle ages the foremost scholars had continued to
cherish the astronomical knowledge of the Greeks, which had been
conveniently collected and systematized by a celebrated mathematician
and scholar living in Egypt in the second century of the Christian era
--Ptolemy by name. Among other theories and ideas, Ptolemy taught that
the earth is the center of the universe, that revolving about it are
the moon, Mercury, Venus, the sun, the other planets, and the fixed
stars, and that the entire machine is turned with incredible velocity
completely around every twenty-four hours.
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