Patricia Lantz has published a nice assortment of quotes attributed to well-known people on the subject of astrology. The quotes can be found in an interesting article on the use of astrology by a variety of presidents in the past. (You can read my article on Ronald Reagan’s use of astrology here.)
What some wise men, seers and other well known names have said about astrology:
It was in Poor Richard’s Almanac that Ben Franklin wrote about astrology, saying: “Oh the wonderful knowledge to be found in the stars. Even the smallest things are written there…if you had but skill to read.”
President Theodore Roosevelt kept his horoscope mounted on a chess board in the oval office. When asked about it he would reply, “I always keep my weather eye on the opposition of my seventh house Moon to my first house Mars.”
JP Morgan, America’s first billionaire, said : “Millionaires don’t use astrology, billionaires do.”
Donald Reagan, formerly Ronald Reagan’s Chief of Staff said: “It’s common knowledge that a large percentage of Wall Street brokers use astrology.”
The Philosopher Plato said : “Perhaps there is a pattern set up in the heavens for one who desires to see it, and having seen it, to find one in himself.”
Physicist Albert Einstein said : “Astrology is a science in itself and contains an illuminating body of knowledge. It taught me many things and I am greatly indebted to it.”
Physicist Sir Isaac Newton said in defence of astrology, to sceptic Edmund Halley:
“I have studied the matter. You sir, have not”.
The poet Ralph Waldo Emerson said : “Astrology is astronomy brought down to earth and applied toward the affairs of man.”
Hippocrates, the Father of Medicine said : “A physician without the knowledge of astrology has no right to call himself a physician.”
Author DH Lawrence said : “Who knows the power that Saturn has over us, or Venus?
But it is a vital power, rippling exquisitely through us all the time.”
Scientist Louis Pasteur said : “The controls of life are structured as forms and nuclear arrangements, in relation with the motions of the universe.”
Mark Twain said: “I was born with Halley’s Comet and I expect to die upon its return,” and he did.
Mathematician Pythagoras said: “The stars in the heavens sing a music if only we had ears to hear.”
St. Thomas Aquinas told all who would listen: “The celestial bodies are the cause of all that takes place in the sublunar world.”
Sir Francis Bacon, the father of modern science told us, “The natures and dispositions of men are, not without truth, distinguished from the predominance of the planets.”
Confucius taught his followers that, “Heaven sends down its good and evil symbols and wise men act accordingly.”
Dante called astrology, “The noblest of sciences.”
Shakespeare said, in the person of King Lear…”The stars above govern our condition.” He follows that with “I was born sir, when the Crab was ascending: all my affairs go backwards.”
Goethe wrote an astrological description of his birth...”These auspicious aspects, which the astrologers subsequently interpreted for me, may have been the causes of my preservation.”
Dr. Carl Jung, one of the founding fathers of psychology said: “Astrology is assured recognition from psychology without further restrictions, because astrology represents the summation of all the knowledge of antiquity. The fact that it is possible to construct, in adequate fashion, a person’s character from the data of his nativity, shows the validity of astrology.”
Astronomer Johannes Kepler, the author of Kepler’s Laws of Planetary Motion wrote, “An unfailing experience of mundane events in harmony with the changes occurring in the heavens, has instructed and compelled my unwilling belief.”
posted April 8, 2010 at 2:39 pm
Excellent article! I knew that Teddy (cousin to FDR) was a Scorpio which would explain his interest to the metaphysical sciences however I didn’t realize he had a working knowledge of astrology.
posted April 8, 2010 at 5:23 pm
Thanks for the mention…that piece sparked a lot of comments…and some interesting discussions in the comment section.
posted April 9, 2010 at 8:07 am
These are wonderful! I particularly like Newton’s – I may use it.
posted April 9, 2010 at 7:25 pm
Interesting and amazing. In fact too amazing for me, so I did a little research. Here is what Wikipedia says about Einstein’s quote:
Die Astrologie ist eine Wissenschaft für sich. Aber eine wegweisende. Ich habe viel aus ihr gelernt und vielen Nutzen aus ihr ziehen können. Die physikalischen Erkenntnisse unterstreichen die Macht der Sterne über irdisches Geschick. Die Astrologie aber unterstreicht in gewissem Sinne wiederum die physikalischen Erkenntnisse. Deshalb ist sie eine Art Lebens-elixier für die Gesellschaft!
English: Astrology is a science in itself and contains an illuminating body of knowledge. It taught me many things, and I am greatly indebted to it. Geophysical evidence reveals the power of the stars and the planets in relation to the terrestrial. In turn, astrology reinforces this power to some extent. This is why astrology is like a life-giving elixir to mankind.
German quote attributed to Einstein in Huters astrologischer Kalender 1960 [A]
Translated by Tad Mann, unidentified 1987 work
Contradicted by Denis Hamel, The End of the Einstein-Astrology-Supporter Hoax, Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. 31, No. 6 (Nov-Dec 2007), pp. 39-43
Alice Calaprice, The Expanded Quotable Einstein: “Attributed to Einstein […] An excellent example of a quotation someone made up and attributed to Einstein in order to lend an idea credibility.”
If the bee disappears from the surface of the earth, man would have no more than four years to live. No more bees, no more pollination … no more men!
A variant – “Professor Einstein, the learned scientist, once calculated that if all bees disappeared off the earth, four years later all humans would also have disappeared” – appears in The Irish Beekeeper, v.19-20, 1965-66, p74, citing Abeilles et Fleurs (Bees and Flowers, the house magazine of Union Nationale de l’Apiculture Française) for June 1965. Snopes.com mentions its use in a beekeepers’ protest in 1994 in Europe [2] suggesting invention and attribution to Einstein for political reasons.
The most fundamental question we can ever ask ourselves is whether or not the universe we live in is friendly or hostile.
This has been quoted in a relatively few places on the internet, but seems to have no earlier source than an obscure web essay “Reinventing Failure: Designing Success” by Harald Anderson, where the statement seems to have been a loose summation of Einstein’s ideas rather than a quote: “Albert Einstein once commented that the most fundamental question we can ever ask ourselves is whether or not the universe we live in is friendly or hostile. He hypothesized that your answer to that question would determine your destiny.
Quoted in Morris Berman: Coming to Our Senses (1989) pp. 41
OK, the last two quotations are not about astrology, but they illustrate how quotations get made up and attributed to famous people to support someone’s claim on everything from astrology to bee keeping, so I have to question the validity of most of these so-called quotes
posted April 9, 2010 at 7:35 pm
I’ve used astrology most of my life because it is so interesting and also to help me in the workplace with coworkers and others. It’s fantastic to know that these famous people have used and still do just like myself! (:-)))))))))
posted April 9, 2010 at 9:52 pm
Excellent post! Thanks, Lynn.
@Ken: Relying on Wikipedia as a resource for accurate information is risky at best. http://factchecked.org/2010/lesson-plans/wikiality/
That said, I believe one can always find “evidence” or “facts” to support one’s point of view, belief or ideology. As someone who has spent 40 years looking for the “gotcha” in astrology, I also believe that the famous minds – and some infamous, i.e. Adolph Hitler – quoted here, understood why the belief in and practice of astrology has survived thousands of years.
So I suppose that at the end of the day, it matters not who the greats are or were that expressed a belief in astrology: it only matters if we find the astrological laws of the universe at work in our own lives.
This Scorpio keeps a “weathered eye” on the 7th house Saturn square to 10th house Mars. (:-)
posted April 10, 2010 at 10:14 am
Thank you Ken for sharing your research. Whenever I read quotes I often google them to see whether they really can be attributed to the person. For example, the quote by JP Morgan is so widely shared but there doesn’t seem to be any real historical record. We do know though that he was a client of the great Evangeline Adams.
The proof of astrological work is in the pudding and the experience, it’s not something you “believe in.” It’s something you experience. My sister thought it was all rubbish for many years. When I started writing this blog she became somewhat interested, and then she started asking me questions about certain time cycles or things that her husband was going through, and I think now she is somewhat of a convert. Although she probably wouldn’t admit it.
posted April 11, 2010 at 4:05 pm
I agree with you, Lynn. I think Johannes Kepler said it best!
Thanks for posting the article.
posted August 14, 2010 at 4:15 pm
J. P. Morgan died in 1912. There were no USD or British billionaires at the time. The quote is, unfortunately, yet another self-serving fraudulent statement made against an individual who in his day was – despite his many all too human failings – a great American financier.