Like Idus and Calendæ Englisht
The Quarter-days, by skilful linguist.[1]
And yet with canting, slight, and cheat,
'Twill serve their turn to do the feat; 920
Make fools believe in their foreseeing
Of things before they are in being;
To swallow gudgeons ere they're catch'd,
And count their chickens ere they're hatch'd,[2]
Make them the constellations prompt, 925
And give 'em back their own accompt;
But still the best to him that gives
The best price for't, or best believes.
Some towns and cities, some for brevity,
Have cast the 'versal world's nativity, 930
And made the infant stars confess,
Like fools or children, what they please.
Some calculate the hidden fates
Of monkeys, puppy-dogs, and cats;
Some running nags, and fighting-cocks, 935
Some love, trade, law-suits, and the pox:
Some take a measure of the lives
Of fathers, mothers, husbands, wives;
Make opposition, trine, and quartile,
Tell who is barren, and who fertile; 940
As if the planet's first aspect
The tender infant did infect[3]
- ↑ Mr Smith, of Harleston, says this is probably a banter upon Sir Richard Fanshawe's translation of Horace, Epod. ii. 69, 70.Omnem relegit idibus pecuniam,
Quærit calendis ponere.At Michaelmas calls all his monies in,
And at our Lady puts them out again.The 10th of March, May, July, and October, and the 13th of all other months, were the Ides. The 1st of every month was the Calends. - ↑ Handbook of Proverbs, pp. 81, &c. See also L'Estrange's Fables, Part ii. fab. 205, and Spectator, No. 535.
- ↑ The accent is laid upon the last syllable of aspéct. Astrologers reckon five aspects of the planets: conjunction, sextile, quartile, trine, and opposition. Sextile denotes their being distant from each other a sixth part of a circle, or two signs; quartile, a fourth part, or three signs; trine, a third part, or four signs; opposition, half the circle, or directly opposite. It was the opinion of judicial astrologers, that whatever good disposition the infant might otherwise have been endued with, yet if its birth was, by any
