by Claudius Ptolemy (Author)
OF the means of prediction through astronomy, O Syrus, two ara the most important and valid. One, which is first both in order and in effectiveness, is that whereby we apprehend the aspects of the movements of sun, moon, and stars in relation to each other and to the earth, as they occur from time to time; the second is that in which by means of the natural character of these aspects themselves we investigate the changes which they bring about in that which they surround. The first of these, which has its own science, desirable in itself even though it does not attain the result given by its combination with the second, has been expounded to you as best we could in its own treatise by the method of demonstration. We shall now give an account of the second and less self-sufficient method in a properly philosophical way