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It is to no purpose, therefore, that that famous fiction about the
potter's wheel is brought forward, which tells of the answer which
Nigidius is said to have given when he was perplexed with this
question, and on account of which he was called Figulus. For,
having whirled round the potter's wheel with all his strength he marked
it with ink, striking it twice with the utmost rapidity, so that the
strokes seemed to fall on the very same part of it. Then, when the
rotation had ceased, the marks which he had made were found upon the
rim of the wheel at no small distance apart. Thus, said he,
considering the great rapidity with which the celestial sphere
revolves, even though twins were born with as short an interval between
their births as there was between the strokes which I gave this wheel,
that brief interval of time is equivalent to a very great distance in
the celestial sphere. Hence, said he, come whatever dissimilitudes
may be remarked in the habits and fortunes of twins. This argument is
more fragile than the vessels which are fashioned by the rotation of
that wheel. For if there is so much significance in the heavens which
cannot be comprehended by observation of the constellations, that, in
the case of twins, an inheritance may fall to the one and not to the
other, why, in the case of others who are not twins, do they dare,
having examined their constellations, to declare such things as pertain
to that secret which no one can comprehend, and to attribute them to
the precise moment of the birth of each individual? Now, if such
predictions in connection with the natal hours of others who are not
twins are to be vindicated on the ground that they are founded on the
observation of more extended spaces in the heavens, whilst those very
small moments of time which separated the births of twins, and
correspond to minute portions of celestial space, are to be connected
with trifling things about which the mathematicians are not wont to be
consulted, for who would consult them as to when he is to sit, when to
walk abroad, when and on what he is to dine?, how can we be justified
in so speaking, when we can point out such manifold diversity both in
the habits, doings, and destinies of twins?
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