They became expert physiognomists and excellent judges of human nature, and were thus able to foretell futures with the same shrewdness and by the same methods as the modern "mediums," palmists, and fortune-tellers.

To strengthen belief in their powers, it became a common thing for some supposedly lost document of the astrologer to be mysteriously discovered after an important event, this document purporting to foretell this very event.

It was also a common practice with astrologers to retain, or have access to, their original charts, cleverly altering them from time to time to fit conditions.
The dangers attendant upon astrology were of such a nature that the lot of the astrologer was likely to prove anything but an enviable one.
As in the case of the alchemist, the greater the reputation of an astrologer the greater dangers he was likely to fall into.

If he became so famous that he was employed by kings or noblemen, his too true or too false prophecies were likely to bring him into disrepute--even to endanger his life.
Throughout the dark age the astrologers flourished, but the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were the golden age of these impostors.

A skilful astrologer was as much an essential to the government as the highest official, and it would have been a bold monarch, indeed, who would undertake any expedition of importance unless sanctioned by the governing stars as interpreted by these officials.
It should not be understood, however, that belief in astrology died with the advent of the Copernican doctrine.