The true place, viz. sign and degree in the Zodiack of any New Star, Comet, Stella Crinita, or Miraculous Apparition, ought to be had (if possibly it may be obtained.) If the degree cannot be procured, yet the sign wherein any such Phaenomena appears, must assuredly be known, and as near the degree thereof as may be. For though Philosophy and Philosophers teach us, that Comets have a matter or Ethereal substance, of which they are created, yet those Learned men wanting Angelical conversation are deceived. For how should it come to pass, that a rude Matter from which they say Comets are derived or created, should put the Comet into such and such a form, and cause it to be either Direct or Retrograde, or the Tail thereof to be of one colour in some Comets, and different in others, of such a magnitude, form, or length, and to vary in motion to the several quarters of the heavens, where the effects do ever most certainly succeed either for good or for ill? Therefore the secret Learning of which few of the Ancients had any knowledge is most to be adhered unto, but rarely to be communicated to Mankind; but this is obiter. - William Lilly (1602.-1681.)