Stellar Theology and Masonic Astronomy

Chapter 3. A Chapter of Astronomical Facts clear idea of the effect of this phenomenon. The point marked ( ) Aries would then slowly advance above the equator until the point marked was at the intersection of the two circles.

The Fishes ( ) would then be on the equinox, which is now the case. In time, this motion being continued, would occupy that place, and so on.

The point where the sun crossed the equator was once in the constellation Aries, but in the long progress of centuries the place of the sun's crossing has fallen back 30° from the first degree of that constellation, so that the vernal equinox is now really in the constellation Pisces, the Fishes; or, in other words, the sun enters the stars of the constellation Pisces on the 21st of March, and not those of the constellation Aries, as it did twenty-two centuries ago, as we are informed by Hipparchus. The place, however, where the sun crosses the celestial equator has continued to be, and still is, and will continue to be, marked by the sign ( ) Aries, so that the sign of Aries now marks the place in the zodiac of the constellation of the Fishes. The signs and the constellations are therefore no longer in the same place. Hence, in order to make our chart of the zodiac (page 42) strictly correct, the sign Aries ( ) should be placed against the constellation Pisces, the sign against the constellation Gemini, the sign against the constellation Cancer, and so around the entire circle. It was only for the sake of simplicity and a greater ease of explanation that it was not so represented. When, therefore, it is said in astronomical language that the summer solstice is in Cancer, it is the sign ( ) only which is intended for the sun at that period now really enters the stars of the constellation Gemini. In like manner the winter solstice is in the sign , but in the constellation Sagittarius; the autumnal equinox in the sign , but in the constellation Virgo.

This precession of the equinoxes is still going on, but the other four cardinal points of the zodiac will always continue to be marked by the signs and and and , without 53