THE RETURN OF TIE STAR-GAZERS
By W. E. WOOSNAM-JONES IT is now well over two centuries since Swift, in the Bickerstaff Papers, launched his famous attack upon John Partridge, the notorious Almanack Maker, and the whole noxious tribe of fortune-tellers and astrologers who infested the London of his day. The Bickerstaff episode, with its macabre prediction of Partridge's own death and its subsequent grimly circumstantial account of his repentant death-bed scenes (Partridge was, in fact, not dead at all, but Swift kept on insisting that he was, and rejected all dementis), was admittedly a cruel one, for Swift was ever a merciless opponent, but it was both necessary and justifiable. With the lucid logical mind of the eighteenth century the great satirist looked with surprise and distaste upon the whole unsavoury fraternity of soothsayers and star-gazers whose advertisements beplastered London and whose terrify- ing prophecies and predictions yearly drove hundreds of wretched men and women to madness and suicide. For an honest rogue Swift had, as we know, a sneaking sympathy, but for those charlatans who battened upon the superstitious fears and apprehensions of their fellow men he had none. So he advanced to the attack, and whatever reputation still remained to Partridge and his noisome crew foundered forthwith in the gales of laughter and jeering which poured upon them from the wits and the tits of the town. With one shrewd thrust he had burst the bubble, doubtless, he must have hoped, for ever.
One wonders what Swift would think were he alive today. From being the tea-time amusement of the country maid- servant and the shady occupation of certain furtive dwellers in dubious side-streets, fortune-telling and astrological pre- diction have recently entered the arena of " big business," and are now already become almost as integral a part of our national life as the football pools, and of about the same value to the community. It can be a source of little pride to those who loudly proclaim the educative mission of the modern Press and the ethical standards of British journalism to note how completely Fleet Street during the past few months his capitulated to this resurgence of primitive superstition. One after another our popular London dailies have succumbed to the new demand, and now regularly and nonchalantly offer their columns for " Fortune Forecasts " and " Lucky Horoscopes " to advise and guide their many millions of readers, the proud product of over half a century's free State education, who gladly accept with all due seriousness this invaluable advice from the planets. There are, of course, some notable exceptions. Among them it is pleasant to discover The Times and the Daily Herald for once in amicable and laudable company. But these exceptions are few. The situation is even worse when one turns to the Sunday Press. With two obvious excep- tions this is riddled through and through with the new quackery. One does not know which most to deplore, the moronic mentality which demands and absorbs this drivel, or the cynical venality which supplies it.
It is easy to deprecate and minimise the influence of this new charlatanism on our national life, but to do so is seriously to misjudge the situation. Our newspaper mag- nates are not in business for fun. The space in their journals is valuable, and we may be certain that this steady spate of prediction and prophecy would not long be allowed to continue if there were not a large and increasing demand for it. Tactful enquiry among friends and acquaintances will quickly produce surprising evidence of the very serious way in which these horoscopes and forecasts are regarded in family and in business circles by considerable numbers of our populace. A few days ago one of our biggest business magnates brought the subject up in conversation with the writer. He said he was amazed to discover the number of his own business friends, men of very considerable ability and position, who studied the weekly forecasts of their favourite newspapers with religious care. Should a certain day be indicated as unlucky for signing papers or for making important decisions, they flatly refused to sign papers or to make decisions on that day. He assured the writer that his own business transactions had not infrequently been impeded for this reason. Becoming interested in this matter he made further enquiries, and discovered that a very con- siderable percentage of his employees frankly admitted that they regularly studied their daily or weekly newspaper horo- scope, and were strongly influenced by it.
The writer's own experience amply confirms this. One has only to keep one's ears open in trains and 'buses to note the numbers of people who are repeating the reassuring statement that although there will be a crisis in the spring there will be no war, on the satisfying authority of Old Moore's Almanack. With this kind of background to the public thought we need scarcely be surprised by the in- glorious spectacle of one of our more reputable popular Sunday newspapers proudly announcing that in it alone may the discriminating reader find the authentic predictions of Petulengro, the Gipsy Oracle, to which a rival organ makes the truly shattering counter-blast that its editorial staff has been strengthened by the engagement of no less a man than Old Moore himself. We may, no doubt, shortly expect to hear that tempting offers are being made by other bitter rivals to Old Mother Shipton. The reasons for this extraordinary outburst of public credulity are not far to seek. In times of settled peace and order men's minds for the most part are content with the present, and do not turn with apprehension to the future. It is in times of fear and doubt and uncertainty that even educated men and women seek uneasily to lift the veil of the future and to find guidance and reassurance concerning the things to come. Thus it was, in this country, in the days of Napoleon, thus it was, in our own memory, during the late War, and so it is once again when uncertainties and grave apprehensions assail our national life. The decrease of a settled religious faith among our populace plays its part too. Men and women today are ready to snatch at straws to help and comfort them. It is proof enough that our national nerve, though not shaken, is sorely disturbed. And it is for those of us who have a deeper faith, and whose steadfast belief it is that an eternal purpose for good cannot in the end fail or be defeated, to reassure and strengthen those around us who do not share it with us.
But, somewhere, John Partridge must be grinning.
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