At no period were the
sovereigns of the world more eager for the study of these mysteries.
The Fuggers of Augsburg, in whom all modern Luculluses will recognize
their princes, and all bankers their masters, were gifted with powers
of calculation it would be difficult to surpass. Well, those practical
men, who loaned the funds of all Europe to the sovereigns of the
sixteenth century (as deeply in debt as the kings of the present day),
those illustrious guests of Charles V. were sleeping partners in the
crucibles of Paracelsus. At the beginning of the sixteenth century,
Ruggiero the elder was the head of that secret university from which
issued the Cardans, the Nostradamuses, and the Agrippas (all in their
turn physicians of the house of Valois); also the astronomers,
astrologers, and alchemists who surrounded the princes of Christendom
and were more especially welcomed and protected in France by Catherine
de' Medici. In the nativity drawn by Basilio and Ruggiero the elder,
the principal events of Catherine's life were foretold with a
correctness which is quite disheartening for those who deny the power
of occult science.
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