ns distinctly confirm it.
The great majority of the tablets are of an astrological character,
recording the supposed influence of the heavenly bodies, singly, in
conjunction, or in opposition, upon all sublunary affairs, from the fate
of empires to the washing of hands or the paring of nails. The modern
prophetical almanac is the legitimate descendant and the sufficient
representative of the ancient Chaldee Ephemeris, which was just as
silly, just as pretentious, and just as worthless.

The Chaldee astrology was, primarily and mainly, genethlialogical.
It inquired under what aspect of the heavens persons were born, or
conceived, and, from the position of the celestial bodies at one or
other of these moments, it professed to deduce the whole life and
fortunes of the individual. According to Diodorus, it was believed
that a particular star or constellation presided over the birth of each
person, and thenceforward exercised over his life a special malign or
benignant influence. But his lot depended, not on this star alone, but
on the entire aspect of the heavens at a certain moment. To cast the
horoscope was to reproduce this aspect, and then to read by means of it
the individual's future.

Chaldee astrology, was not, however, limited to genethlialogy. The
Chaldaeans professed to predict from the stars such things as the
changes of the weather, high winds and storms, great heats, the
appearance of comets, eclipses, earthquakes, and the like. They
published lists of luck and unlucky days, and tables showing what aspect
of the heavens portended good or evil to particular countries. Curiously
enough, it appears that they regarded their art as locally limited to
the regions inhabited by themselves and their kinsmen, so that while
they could boldly predict storm, tempest, failing or abundant crops,
war, famine, and the like, for Syria, Babylonia, and Susiana, they could
venture on no prophecies with respect to other neighboring lands, as
Persia, Media, Armenia.

A certain amount of real meteorological knowledge was probably mixed
up with the Chaldaean astrology. Their calendars, like modern almanacs,
boldly predicted the weather for fixed days in the year. They must
also have been mathematicians to no inconsiderable extent, since their
methods appear to have been geometrical. It is said that the Greek
mathematicians often quoted with approval the works of their Chaldaean
predecessors, Ciden, Naburianus, and Sudinus. Of the n