A _terra incognita_, lying in the vicinity of Tothill Fields.
"Show his eyes and grieve his heart; Come like shadows, so depart."
DIVARICATING from the beaten track of all my predecessors in the Celestial Art, whose method it hath ever been to leave the interpretation of their symbolical prefigurements to be explorated and divined by the subtlety of the ingenious reader himself,—by the which they did shroud, in a tenfold tenebrosity of Cimmerian gloom, their no-meaning mysteries, and ambiguous puzzlements;—deviating, I say, from such a course, I do herewith not only present thee, as hath been my custom, with an Hieroglyphic "adapted to the times," but lifting the veil of obscurity, wherein it is shrouded from vulgar apprehension, lay patent and exposed the hidden meaning thereof.
It hath in it the three grand postulates or requirements of a veritable Hieroglyphic, _videlicet_,—It is Astroscopical, Astrological, and Prophetical:—
It is _Astroscopical_, as it is founded on an observation of the Stars.
It is _Astrological_, as it is indicative of planetary potency and lunar influence; and
It is _Prophetical_, inasmuch as it not only presenteth the present, but futurizeth the future.
_Taurus_, the _Bull_ (egregious John!), having, through a plethora of purse, fallen into a dreamy mood, yielded himself up to a somniferous influence, which becloudeth, with a misty obfuscation, his natural senses; whereupon the megrims of his crazy brain do set themselves to work, and conjure up certain airy visions of speculative aggrandizement.
Floating _in nubibus_ before his fancy's eye, are sundry bubbles, blown by an Imp of Speculation, who ruleth the phantasies which do take John's imagination captive. _Gemini_ (the Twins) in the similitude of a joint-stock Company proffer him wealth;—baseless castles, of unsubstantial fabric, resting on ether, do shadow forth his brick-and-mortar predilections;—and a rail-road betwixt Dover and Calais, uniting that which nature had dissevered, accomplisheth that propinquity, which John ever affecteth for good neighbourhood and fellowship; while _Luna_, who hath established a reciprocity rail-road with our planet, grinneth at his gullibility, and marketh him for her own.