Proem

There is a remarkable autobiographical fragment written by Francis Bacon around 1603/04, "in stately Latin", and found in his cabinet. It consists of a "Proem", in the form of reflections on his life's work, and in the course of it he says: "For myself, I found that I was fitted for nothing so well as the Study of Truth; as having a mind nimble and versatile enough to catch the Resemblances of Things (which is the chief point) and at the same time steady enough to fix and distinguish their Subtler Differences; as being gifted by nature with "Desire to Seek, patience to Doubt, fondness to Meditate, slowness to assert, readiness to consider, carefulness to dispose and set in order; and as being a man that neither affects what is new nor admires what is old, and hates every kind of Imposture. so I thought my nature had a kind of familiarity and Relationship with Truth".

Having had a similar motivation myself all my life, and having been able, in the most crucial seven year period between the ages of 63-70 (1979-1986), to be introduced to and study in depth, and in parallel, both astrology and the works of Jung, I was led, between 1991 and 1993, by destiny or the stars, to incorporate a summary of all I had learned up to then, of the knowledge I had put together in this lifetime, in a book, Astrology as a New Model of Reality", subtitled: The Philosophy of Astrology and its Relation to Jungian Psychology. 

As well as the particular themes indicated in the title and sub-title, the subject of this work is that one has to be inclusive as possible, for knowledge of any particular subject to be correctly aligned to the current state of knowledge in other fields. This is contrary to the prevailing custom of considering each subject as a law unto itself, with its own dogmas that do not have to be subject to criticism from other fields. It can and does ignore advances in other such fields that may invalidate those dogmas, and for this reason its adherents prefer not to hear about them. But unless our ideas develop consistently along the whole front they become quickly irrelevant if not obstructive and subversive.

Most people are uneasy with anything that exceeds their own limits of consciousness, and like to be left undisturbed within their own circle of familiar ideas, while conventional opinion safely takes care of all the rest. Or they identify their own egos with their territory. To range too widely and to bring in other things is too much of a threat or challenge.

People correctly educated, knowing only particular subjects, even unconventional ones like astrology, will think on reading me that I get all my facts wrong, since nothing I say conforms to what they have been taught in school, university or Sunday bible class, in so far as it refers to anything they have considered at all; or else it touches on subjects they would rather not consider, such as the psychology of the unconscious, since this tends to undermine their favourite fantasies, beliefs, convictions and projections. 

I address this question of general tunnel vision, and the resulting mental that prevails in our world, in the Introduction to the above work, perhaps in rather uncompromising terms. the equivalent in the social and political world is unyielding sectarian dogmatism - frozen minds. It is true that it may be difficult for those committed to a specific career, and having to qualify in ti within a limited time and financial span, to cover a wide range, or even several subjects, and perhaps the absence of such a career favoured this in my case, as well as a predominance of earth and air, leading to a realistic balance between physical, practical activity and intellectual pursuits, initially between science and art (in astrology, saturn conjunct Neptune). And a predilection for one thing led to another.