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In presenting the Secondary Chart, we offer our own term for a product of the ancients little used by astrologers of today, dropped because of the inclination of modern astrologers to attempt to fit their work into the dogma of a fiction-loving academic world endeavoring to blend everything into a causal hypothesis, and audaciously and perhaps criminally labeling the package "Science." There has been the unfortunate attempt to fit into a world where every effort has been made to reach a truth by locking one series of errors into another greater series of errors.
It is not too unusual to hear an astrologer make reference to the "Pars Fortuna" or "Part of Fortune", with no particular conception of what such a thing might be, and without making any particular effort to find out. Like house cusps or sign cusps or aspects, the Pars Fortuna is a mere mathematical point and only one of a whole series of mathematical points. It is a tiny part of a pattern. It is as significant as the last numeral on an automobile license tag, which will classify it as not belonging to 90 percent of the automobiles, but it will not identify the car insofar as the other ten percent of cars is concerned. The Pars Fortuna is a single point in the secondary Chart, just as the Moon is a single point in the horoscope of birth.
Let us assume that you have a natal chart before You, and let us assume that you have all the planets attached to each other by some means whereby you can move them all at once without moving the signs of the zodiac or the houses, but you move the planets within the zodiac and within the houses. As you move one body, you move all bodies, and you move them all an equal distance when you move one. If you had the planets on a separate piece of paper that would turn and if you had the planets and the degrees between the planets accurately drawn to scale, this would be quite easy.
Now, you move or twist all the planets as you might move or twist a radio dial. Let us say that you are "tuning" so to speak. You twist the dial until the Sun coincides with the ascendent.. You stop there and all the other bodies have fallen into place. This is the Secondary Chart. You have maintained the original planetary pattern. You have not changed that but you have adjusted it to allow measurement from the Zodiacal position of the ascendent instead of from the Zodiacal position of the Sun. This was a procedure followed by the ancients thousands of years ago, and such an operation furnishes us with ample proof that the ancients were employing astrology as pure mathematics, and if their procedure was unsound, then it is just as unsound to employ algebra, because an algebraic equation is a mere pattern of an abstract principle, and the Secondary Chart is a mere pattern of an abstract principle. When a child is taught that 9X9 equals 81, it makes no difference whether the truth is applied to horses or cans of preserved peaches; the abstract truth is there. It is something that can be applied in a material or any other kind of a world, and we do not hesitate to argue if someone claims that just because 9 rows of 9 horses total 81 horses, that does not prove that 9 rows of 9 cans of preserved peaches total 81 cans of preserved peaches.
If the Moon happened to be 120 degrees west of the Sun in the original birth chart, it will remain 120 degrees west of the Sun, but now it will be exactly on the cusp of the Ninth House, because the Ninth House Cusp is 120 degrees west of the ascendent and the Sun has been moved to the ascendent.
In the birth chart, the Moon was not at the cusp of the Ninth House, but because in this Secondary Chart, the Moon is at the cusp of the Ninth House, this mathematical point becomes attuned to transits. The position of the Moon in the Secondary Chart is that which we have called the "Pars Fortuna" or "Part of Fortune." The fact that we have already associated the Moon with the Individual Survival Dynamic and with money should be sufficient to explain why the ancients called this point the Part of Fortune.
There will be a similar point in the Secondary Chart for each of the planets. If Jupiter was 3 degrees east of the Sun in the natal chart, it is now 3 degrees east of the ascendent or right in the middle of the Second House of the Secondary Chart. If the original chart had 13 degrees of Libra on the ascendent, we now find Jupiter at 28 degrees of Scorpio. Remember that we do not change the natal ascendent We do not change the degrees of the Zodiac on the House Cusps. We merely change the planets within the chart. By this means, the ancients set up a whole series of mathematical points in addition to the regular planetary positions.
Unfortunately, it is impossible to determine these additional points that make up the Secondary Chart unless the exact time of birth or the exact degree of the zodiac that is on the ascendent at birth is known. If your ascendent is in error by one degree, then all of these mathematical points will be in error by one degree. However, the experienced astrologer will discover that these points furnish an excellent means of further checking the tine of birth, because once they have been reliably established, transits to these points appear every bit as important as transits to other factors in the natal chart.
Little or almost no work or research in connection with this Secondary Chart has been accomplished in modern times, and it is doubtful whether the student can go very far with research except in those few cases where there can be some degree of certainty about the ascending degree of the chart. If the student feels certainty about his own ascending degree, then there will be an exciting bit of experimentation ahead. If the chart is correctly timed, then a whole new realm of transits is opened up for inspection. By the time the student reaches this lesson, there will be a good deal of familiarity with the author's writing, thinking and style, and the student may be interested in noting that his Secondary Chart places Mercury at 21- Sagittarius, where it will be conjunct his natal Uranus at 20- Sagittarius.
When you are satisfied that your own birth time has been established correctly, insert the secondary positions into that same chart in red or a different colored ink, and see what happens. The results will often prove startling, because important conjunctions or other aspects between secondary and natal positions can occur for a particular time of day that will not exist for any other time of day, and stupendous differences can exist for persons born less than an hour apart. The above mentioned conjunction of secondary Mercury and natal Uranus would not apply for any persons born at another hour of the same day.
Allow us to emphasize that the Secondary Chart is an almost unexplored matter insofar as modern astrology is concerned. Nothing could offer more definite proof that the ancient astrologers were not causalists. They were mathematicians. Astrology was a study of mathematics, geometrical principles and functions, strictly a study of abstract realms. This is something a mathematician can grasp. Mathematics is pure abstraction and astrology is pure abstraction. Both are keys to the cosmic design of life itself.
We think we have progressed, and we have to some extent, but when we view the last 2500 years, progress has been slight due to the heavy load of dogma we have had to drag along. To a considerable extent, education has been a hindrance rather than a guide, for the better part of education during 2500 years has been blind perpetuation of dogma. We are only beginning to seek freedom from the chains of politically organized religion and academics. It may yet take many years, but when actual enlightenment comes, when it is finally realized that astrology is mere mathematical expression, there is bound to be a terrific impact, for astrology itself opens the door to unlimited realms of mathematical knowledge.
It has been our experience that when the true natal chart has been satisfactorily established to allow consideration of the Secondary Chart, a completely new phase of things is opened up. The value of the natal chart has suddenly been doubled, for half of the whole (If this is the whole). has been previously and subtly concealed. A great deal more of the design has been revealed.
More important than anything else, insofar as this Secondary Chart is concerned, is the fact that it opens up a whole new realm of thought. If we can measure in terms of patterns to this extent, how far can such a principle be carried? Please realize that from here on this conversation must be considered as purely speculative, but let us assume that a person was born with Mars 90 degrees east of Saturn. Can we consider that for the life of that person, Saturn is ALWAYS symbolically 90 degrees west of Mars?
This would mean that as Mars transits the heavens, insofar as that particular individual is concerned, figuratively speaking, a symbolical Saturn is always traveling 90 degrees behind Mars, and as Saturn transits the heavens, a figurative Mars is always traveling 90-degrees ahead of it. This would mean that the pattern of the birth horoscope works in many different ways, but the pattern always remains the same. This is the sort of thing that happens throughout mathematics. It happens in physics, in biology and in psychology. Put steel filings on a piece of paper and place a magnet beneath the paper. A pattern forms, a design, a mathematical design. The steel filings obey a design. Biology always obeys designs, and the psychologist is ever observing patterns and designs that thoughts, emotions and behavior follow. The formations of minerals obey design. Snow flakes obey design. Everything obeys design. Life obeys design.
Although arithmetic was formerly regarded as a very simple branch of mathematics, it has become one of the most involved and complicated since the introduction of number theory by Fermat. During centuries of history of math, there was the inclination to emphasize Euclid and forget Pythagoras as a mystic. There are no greater mystics than the more advanced modern mathematicians. Thus, today, interest in Pythagoras among modern mathematician has been revised.
;Pythagoras was a great mathematician 2500 years ago, but he thought in therms of design. To him, numbers were designs. The triangular numbers were numbers out of which triangles could be formed.
Note that any two consecutive triangular numbers, when added together equal a square, which means that any square is the sum of two consecutive triangular numbers. Note also that if you set the smaller triangular numbers on the larger triangular numbers, in layers, consecutively, you form a tetrahedron or 3-sided pyramid, while if you do the same with the squares, you form a 4 sided pyramid. Today, the mathematicians deal with all sorts of these series of numbers. The pentagonal numbers have very interesting characteristics. They are numbers that can be formed into 5-sided-designs. By playing with these designs, the mathematician makes all kinds of discoveries, and he then finds counterparts of these designs everywhere in nature, It was Euclid who said, "God geometrizes". The whole universe is put together according to geometrical design. The ancients knew this, but we have been living through 2500 years of dogma, during which time our academicians and religious leaders forgot the ancients. The ancients saw geometrical laws working in the heavens and on earth, in the macrocosm and the microcosm. The told us, "As above, so below?" That's where astrology came in. They applied their designs to the solar system as well to the lower world, and realized that by watching the laws of nature function in the upper world you can know how those laws function in the lower world. The ancient astrologers were mathematicians and the ancient mathematicians were astrologers. There were no astronomers. They came later as the illegitimate children of the rape of astrology by the church.
The great mathematicians of today live in another world, Few people understand them. They talk in symbols and a language that others do not understand. They reach a point where they leave numbers behind and talk in symbols, each symbol expressing some broad principle of the abstract world. It was in this way that they reached the secrets of the atom. They have merely been traversing the same world where the minds of the Greek mathematicians moved about. Remember that it was the ancient Greeks, who originally conceived the idea of the atom. We are told that the Greeks visualized the atom as something akin to a billiard ball in shape and design, but that is merely the modern academician's conception of how the Greeks conceived of an atom. Billiard balls do not fit together into a solid. There is space in-between the balls. The ancients did not think along those lines. They knew all about geometrical designs in three dimensions. They knew, for example, that twelve-sided objects having a pentagon,for each side would fit together into a solid. We do not exactly know just how they conceived an atom, and our modern scientists do not know what an atom might look like if. they could see one. They know only how the atom functions mathematically and they can visualize from there, but they keep changing their views as to what an atom is like. Only recently, they have discovered what they call "strange particles", something new about the atom that they didn't take into their previous visualization.
Whether we are dealing with astrology or some other science, progress seems dependent upon the discovery of the secrets of design. It all seems a matter of discovering the, cosmic design of, the abstract world. In the Secondary Chart, we have a great secret that has been passed down to us by the ancients. It is a very useful chart, disclosing many things which cannot otherwise be disclosed, but what we must grasp is not just the method of erecting such a chart, we must realize the vast possibilities that it op ens up to us. It produces entirely new means of astrological measurement. It illustrates that we can employ geometrical astrology pattern for purposes of measurement. We find that the natal horoscope is filled with invisible things we knew nothing about.
Consider the case of identical twins born 16 minutes apart. The ascendent would differ in the two charts by about four degrees. The planets, even the Moon, would be in practically the same zodiacal position, but the secondary position of these planets would all vary by four degrees, like the ascendant and house cusps. If Mars hit secondary Uranus by transit in one chart, it would be a number of days before it would reach secondary Uranus in the other chart, Thus, while transits to the natal positions would be identical for the two twins-born 16 minutes apart, they would not coincide where the secondary planetary positions were concentric in the case where two people were born 12 hours apart, the secondary positions would differ by roughly 180 degrees.
When we stop to realize that astrology is a mere study of abstract mathematical design, the greatest possibility of all opens up for us. That is the indication that the greatest mathematical secrets of all as they relate to all branch's of science, are a actually hidden behind the curtain of the astrological chart. Figure out the truth here, and you are likely to find it elsewhere. Yet, you have to stop thinking in terms of cause-and-effect where astrology is concerned, because until you do, you will not be likely to think in terms of mathematical design or in terms of cosmic design. Any study of number theory will prove helpful in getting away from a causal hypothesis. When we leave this over-ripe hypothesis behind insofar as astrology is concerned, then there is no reason why we should not find the mathematical key repeated in many places. It is no longer unreasonable to find a mathematical pattern in the horoscope, and it is no longer unreasonable if we should also find it in the palm of a person's hand.
Our experience has often indicated that the female mind more easily grasps the conception that things can fall into a mathematical pattern without the need for any causal factor. Perhaps that has been one of our difficulties. For thousands of years, we have tried to convince ourselves that the male mind is superior to that of the female. All the dogma of the last several thousand years has been brought to us by the male. It is only in our own time that we have allowed women to vote. They were not regarded as sufficiently intelligent to vote fifty years ago, and even the writer can remember hearing men argue the point. The first election where women were allowed to vote was anticipated with great apprehension. Most of the first women voters voted only as their husbands directed them. A good wife obeyed her husband because he knew best. The interest of women was supposed to be limited to housework and babies.
The husband belittles his wife if she believes in palmistry, one of the oldest beliefs on earth, but for the palm of a hand to hold the key to a mathematical pattern that is expressed in many places is no more irrational than to believe that all snowflakes freeze with six sides.
In many cases, what we have termed a woman's intuition has merely been her ability to think in terms of patterns, and in principle these patterns are no different from mathematical patterns. They can be patterns of abstract reality, and although the woman can also be wrong, this can apply to the mathematician. It is possible for him to make an error somewhere. He may not have grasped a pattern accurately, and the woman may not have grasped the pattern accurately.
In "The River of Life", by Rutherford Platt, we find a biologist thinking in terms of abstract patterns. Platt is not limited in his thinking by an academic status. He works as an advisor to Walt Disney. He speaks of the "bee animal." Since we are accustomed to thinking of a bee as an insect and not an animal, this requires a bit of explanation. His language and his use of the term "bee animal" helps to get his views across. He does not regard the bee as an animal. By "bee animal", he means the abstract pattern of the whole hive. He refers to the whole swarm as an animal. He compares individual bees to the individual cells of the human body, pointing out how individual cells sacrifice themselves for the welfare of the body as a whole, and demonstrating a parallel where individual bees do likewise and are automatically sacrificed in the interests of the swarm as a whole unit, the bee animal might refer to this as work of the Social Survival Dynamic if we were dealing with the human pattern.
If we think of the whole unit as the bee animal, then we find that there is a pattern. We can go from hive to hive and we find that all bee animals behave in a similar manner. In all bee animals there is one queen bee. Other female bees never become queens because they are fed on pollen mush for only two days, and after that they are fed on nothing but honey. The queen is fed pollen mush for her entire life because pollen mush is necessary to develop her sexually. The other girl bees do not develop sexually. The behavior of one bee animal is exactly the same as the behavior of another bee animal a thousand miles away. There is a pattern, an abstract pattern, and all bee animals behave in accord with this abstract pattern. Just as all cells of a body behave in accord with an abstract pattern, members of a society behave in accord with an abstract pattern. Whether we deal with mathematics, geology, biology or atoms, we find that behavior conforms to abstract patterns. This principle applies to the behavior of minerals as they form themselves into crystals. It applies to the behavior of cells in the human body. It applies to the behavior of bee animals or ant animals. It applies where there is life and where there is no life. It applies to the pattern of thought of a particular individual. One person is conventional and another is unconventional because that was the pattern of birth.
Since the very beginning of this Course, it has been obvious that women have been able to grasp the overall pattern of our discussion more readily than men. In many cases, they appear to have less in the way of mental blocks. Often the individual with little education grasps things better than the person with a well-rounded education. This conforms with Charles Kettering's statement that the greater a man's education, the less apt he is to become an inventor. This does not argue that education is not a requisite. Instead, it points out the weakness and evils of an educational system which teaches people to memorize rather than to understand.
Whether you are to study astrology or mathematics, it is important to learn to think in terms of abstract patterns. Such thinking is a shortcut. You become familiar with a pattern where it applies in one place in nature. You get to understand it, and then you meet up with that pattern again and again in far removed places where there is no possible material connection. In the horoscope the relationship of all planets to each other becomes a pattern. It is like a brand. All of the automatic behavior of the individual conforms to this pattern or brand. This does not mean that the individual, through understanding of his own automatic behavior, cannot begin to behave consciously according to a design of his own conscious making, and when he does this, he is discovering his own powers of free will and employing them to replace his own automatic behavior. The behavior of the bee animal is automatic. Otherwise, it would not be so exactly the same as the behavior of all other bee animals wherever found. Despite the well organized civilization in which the individual bees live, they appear to have done nothing about developing free will. Even the queen herself is a slave to the interests of the hive. All queen bees behave in exactly the same manner. When it Is time to do so, the queen leaves the hive followed by a swarm of males who follow her high into the air. Ultimately, one catches up to her or she allows one to catch up. At this high altitude, the queen has her one taste of sex. This completed, she kills the satisfying male. He has served his purpose as far as the interests of society are concerned. It is now his fate to die. There is no longer need for the other male bees. They are driven from the hive or killed. If they are not killed, it is their fate td starve to death. The queen returns to the hive her sex life is over. Never again will she have romantic contact with a male. This one act of sex has done the job well, and so long as she is fed pollen mush, she will continue to lay eggs. Her duty to society is to lay eggs.
Perhaps we have gone far afield from the Secondary Chart, but it is necessary to understand why the Secondary Chart can be an abstract reality and become as important as the natal chart itself. It is necessary to understand why transits to mathematical points can become as important as transits to points which were actually occupied by material planets at the time of birth. Of course, this is no different than transits to house cusps, because house cusps are mere mathematical points. It is no different than transits through signs of the zodiac, because the division of one sign from another is a mere mathematical point. We begin with the planets and from them arises a whole superstructure of abstract mathematical points. A whole "society" of mathematical points ultimately becomes a mathematical pattern. We have to give a name to the whole society of mathematical points, and just as Platt invented a term for the bee animal the ancients invented a word for the whole mathematical pattern, and they called it a horoscope.
Realize that if a person is born with the Sun exactly on the Eastern horizon, so that half of the Sun is above the horizon and half the Sun is below the horizon (Mountains do not count), then the Natal Chart and the Secondary Chart are one and the same, because the Sun and the ascendent are one and the same. By the time the Sun is one degree above the Ascendent, the Natal and Secondary Charts have parted by one degree. All of the planets, like the Sun, have moved one degree westward (as the earth turned eastward), but in the Secondary Chart, they have not changed, but this is only insofar as their relationship to the ascendent and house cusps are concerned. It depends upon what you are employing as your frame of reference. If you employ the zodiac as your frame of reference, then all the secondary bodies have moved forward in the zodiac by one degree. In other words, in relation to the ascendent and house cusps, all the Secondary planets will remain as they were at sunrise, but in relation to the zodiacal signs, all the planets will move forward in the zodiac as the Sun rises. (Of course, this will be slightly altered to the extent that the planets will have some additional motion of their own during the day, but this is slight. It can be great where the Moon is concerned.)
We have tried to explain this Secondary Chart from a number of different points of view in order that the student may understand it instead of being dependent upon any memorized formula. However, if you want a formula, all you have to do is take the natal chart, measure the distance, east or west, of each body from the Sun and insert it in the Secondary Chart that same distance from the ascendent. If Mercury is ten degrees west of the Sun, insert it ten degrees west of the ascendent, etc. This should be simple enough. If your birth time is in error by ten degrees on the ascendent, then all the secondary positions will be out by ten degrees. You can check transits to the secondary positions. You may find out that they do not work accurately. They may work early or late. This is your key. Constant checking of transits to the secondary positions of the planets in your chart will enable you to correct your time of birth just as constant checking of transits to your house cusps will do the same. When you have the chart exactly right, you will find that all transits to all of these mathematical points will click with precision.
Realize that the planetary pattern in the Secondary Chart is exactly the same as the planetary pattern in the Natal Chart. The relationship of any material planet to all other material bodies is exactly the same in both charts. If Mars was 132 degrees east of Jupiter in one chart, it is also 132 degrees east of Jupiter in the other chart. All we have done is to twist the planetary dial exactly as we twist a radio dial when we are tuning the radio. A small twist of the radio dial may bring us music from New York instead of music from Chicago. If twins are born four minutes apart, all the secondary positions of the second twin have been altered by approximately a degree. Yet, the natal planets can be considered as exactly the same in both charts insofar as the zodiac is concerned.
In closing, let us come back to a short discussion of this difference between the male and female ways of thinking. Our experience with male and female students has been extremely interesting to us and should be interesting to all. We have had a whole series of female students who, after starting this Course, suddenly developed an appetite to know more about mathematics which, up until that time, was repulsive to them. These students are also now studying mathematics and enjoying the study to the full. This tendency has not been near so apparent among male students. This might be accounted for by the fact that on the average our female students have more time. In addition, many of our male students are engineers and already have a mathematical education beyond that of our female students. Nevertheless, we cannot escape the fact that our female students have responded with far more enthusiasm to the whole idea that we live in accord with abstract cosmic design and that both astrology and mathematics are mere studies of abstract cosmic design. We cannot escape the conclusion that female students respond readily to the idea of thinking in terms of abstract patterns, while male students are ever clinging to a more materialistic conception of things. It would appear that our lady students have found it easier to break away from old frames of reference from old thought patterns. Yet, we must also point out that male students with a mathematical background grasp these views much more rapidly than male students without that mathematical background, and we actually do have male students who have begun the study of mathematics anew and with a new enthusiasm for the subject. Among both sexes, there have been signs of a completely new outlook on life, and this we like. Nothing has proved a greater reward to us than those letters coming from some students who state that the Course has altered their whole viewpoint on life for the better.
Many of the reactions of students are valuable, and we cannot bring all of these reactions into the Lessons themselves, but we hope, through STUDENT FORUM, to help students to help each other by the exchange of views on these subjects.
SUPPLEMENT TO LESSON XXI
The Secondary Ascendent
A year or more after Lesson XXI was written, there was an important development. I was off on a hike on the desert one day while the principles of the secondary chart were kicking around in my mind. Suddenly a question came into my mind:
Why shouldn't the secondary chart have its own ascendent?
It dawned on me that the same formula employed to find the planets in the secondary chart could be used to produce a secondary ascendent. I turned around and headed for home.
This was an idea that I wanted to check out right away. Reaching home, I went right to work and I drew the first secondary chart with its own ascendent. -my own.
I got quite a surprise. It gave me a secondary ascendent of 8 Leo with Uranus at 6 Leo. This was most interesting to me because all my life I had found that most astrologers were able to guess my Sagittarius ascendent from my personal appearance, but a few failed and when they failed, they guessed it as Leo. It had always puzzled me because I felt I had Leo characteristics. When young, I always had a flair for showmanship which smacked of Leo. This plus the fact that some astrologers seemed to see Leo in me presented a problem that I should have considered a clue because I did not have one planet in Leo.
In the new secondary chart, the ascendent, Moon and Uranus were all in Leo.
I wrote a letter to all of my students telling them of this experience and asking them to test out the new concept. There was a quick response. They all thought I had hit on something that was for REAL. It explained many things they had not been able to explain.
However, the new discovery simplified everything and made most of the calculations of Lesson XXI unnecessary, for I soon spotted something else.
With my primary and secondary charts side by side, the planets were in exactly the same house positions. It was as if the primary chart had been left alone but the zodiac in the background had been twisted a given number of degrees.
This gives us a much simpler formula for drawing the secondary chart than the one given in Lesson XXI. So, here it is, but remember that the secondary chart is correct and useful ONLY if the given time of birth is correct:
1--Measure the distance from the Sun to the ascendent.
2--Now, go in the opposite direction from the ascendent the same number of degrees. In other words, if your natal Sun was 20 degrees above the ascendent, go 20 degrees below the ascendent. That degree is the secondary ascendent.
3--Put this degree on the ascendent of a new chart. Fill in the cusps with the other zodiacal signs at equal 30 degree intervals.
4--Place the planets in this chart in exactly the same house positions as they appear in the primary chart. If a planet is 10 degrees past the 3rd cusp in the primary chart, place it 10 degrees past the 3rd cusp in the secondary chart.
That's all there is to it.
How does the secondary chart differ. Everybody asks that question.
Actually, they are both part of the same horoscope. We make two charts of it because if we place all the data in one chart it becomes too complicated and impossible to read. As to which chart is more important. I do not know.
As to how they differ, I don't know. I have never been able to decide. In most cases, the primary ascendent seems to have more to do with personal appearance than the secondary chart, but sometimes the opposite seems true. I think it best to consider the two charts of equal importance. This can have a great deal to do with twins because it explains why twins born quite close can be so different. For example, two girls both have Sagittarius on ascendent. One is blonde, the other a brunette. The first girl has a Capricorn secondary ascendent, the second girl an Aquarius secondary ascendent. The first girl has Mars conjunct the primary ascendent. The second girl has Jupiter conjunct the ascendent. This makes the whole combination completely different from the primary chart?
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