Ben Franklin, America's first great astrologer, and the political importance of eclipses.

            Ben Franklin Drawing Electricity From Sky

 There will be a total of six eclipses in this year. The average year has only four, so it seems 2009 is getting more than its fair share. Additionally, the solar eclipse of July 22, 2009 was the longest total solar eclipse of the 21st century. There will not be another like it again until June 2132.

Benjamin Franklin penned these prophetic words in 1736 just prior to the American Revolution: "Suffer me to observe that whoever studies the eclipses of former ages and compares them to the great events in the history of the times and the years in which they happened, shall find that the fall of the Assyrian, Persian, Grecian and Roman monarchies, each of them was remarkably proceeded by great and total eclipses of the heavenly bodies. Observations of this kind, joined with the ancient and long-tryed rules of our art....make me tremble for the Empire now in being."

Benjamin Franklin was a man of importance in many areas of our early history among them:

• He was a member of the Continental Congress that declared independence from Great Britian He was a member of the committee that drafted the Declaration of Independence.
• He established the first public library in the colonies.
• He laid the foundations for modern police and fire departments, for street lighting and highway paving.
• He set up the postal system and helped lay out the Boston Post Road (the legendary Route 1). He made many scientific discoveries such as lightning is a form of electricity.
• He invented bifocal eyeglasses, the lightning rod and the Franklin stove

A little known fact is that Benjamin Franklin, one of the founding fathers of our country, was also an astrologer.

For twenty-five years Franklin wrote and published Poor Richard’s Almanac. The first edition was printed in 1733. His astrological knowledge can be seen from the beginning with an article titled, "The Names and Characters of the Seven Planets" (this was before the discovery of Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto).

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." Then many years later sadly lamented, "The first astrologers I think were honest husbandmen; and so it seems are the last:for my brethren Jerman and Moore and myself, the only remaining almanac makers in this country, are all of that class though in the intermediate times our art has been cultivated in the great cities and even in the court of princes."
 
Writing as Richard Saunders, Benjamin Franklin was given both the freedom to express his thoughts and the freedom to do so with dramatic license

 Other articles you might enjoy

• Thomas Jefferson and the great American paradox
• Pluto returns to Capricorn after 248 years, buckle your seat belts as we go back to the future!
• Israel and Palestine, born May 14, 1948, are Sun sign Taurus

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Patricia Lantz is a practicing astrologer and hypnotherapist living in Atlanta Georgia. Want to know more about Patricia? For a complete bio visit www.astrology-hypnotherapy.com. Then call or write for a free pre-session consultation ~ (678)-763-0552 or email lifescript@comcast.net. Patricia is also the Astrology Editor for All Things Healing, an online community for spiritual and healing practices.

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