"Now if God Almighty do not countermand or check the ordinary course of
nature, or the matter of elementary bodies here below be not
unproportionable, and thereby unapt to receive their impressions, there
is no reason why, in a natural and physical necessity, astrological
predictions should not succeed and take effect, and by how much the
knowledge which we have by the known causes is more demonstrative and
infallible than that which we have either by signs or effects, so much
by this companion doth Astrology appear worthy to be preferred before
Physic." Cardan, who was an excellent physician saith: "If by the art of
Astrology he had not better attained to the knowledge of his diseases,
than the physician that would have administered to him by his skill, he
had been assuredly cured by death, rather than preserved alive by
physic. (Vide his Comment. upon Ptol. Quidrepart.) From hence it appears
it is necessary that the physician should be skilful in astrology, but
on the contrary, _ex quovis legno non fit Mercurius_, every astrologer
cannot be a physician; if the nativity be but precisely known, or if,
but _tempus ablatum_ or _suppositum_, and withal some notable accidents
of sickness, danger of drowning, peril by fire, marriage, or other, the
like accidents may be foreseen.
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