There are two dimensions available in thought, the horizontal and the vertical.

Almost everything that goes on inside most people’s heads belongs to the former. Both rational, logical progression or simply associative mind wandering exist purely in this plane.

There is another possibility which some people call intuition, flashes of insight that come to us as if from another place altogether and have little or no connection to what we were thinking the moment before.

For want of a better word for it, I call this mode, horary thinking.

Horary astrology works on the notion that a thought or question carries with it the astrological symbolism of the moment it is expressed or asked.

This also means that the answer to that question is available at that moment. For horary to work at all, the vertical dimension of thought must be present. We may think we are separate individuals thinking our own thoughts but at these moments we are downloading ideas from the Universe.

The problem, however, is in recognition of this vertical thinking. Are we even aware of it at all?

Are we so locked into the ordinary associative thought processes that we miss it altogether?

If not, how can we trust which thought belongs to which dimension?

My view on this is complex. You have to trust the process but equally you have to be sceptical about each separate manifestation of it. In any kind of astrology,  everything has to be tested. 

Horary thinking is always available to us, but for the most part we miss it because we are not receptive to it. This attunement grows with practice but it can’t be based on blind trust. You have to keep assessing and checking it. If you do this consistently, it will reward you with stunning examples of its own veracity.

A few days ago, I was asked a horary question by a client about her partner who lives in another state.

The 7th house ruler of the horary chart was exactly conjunct his natal Sun to within 10 minutes of arc. It was also in the 9th house of the chart.

This is the kind of thing that happens so often to a horary practitioner that we simply expect it and don’t really pay it much attention, we just go ahead and look for a connection between that ruler and the 1st house one.

But it actually is a stunning confirmation of horary thinking. The odds against this happening by chance are over 20,000 to 1 against.

For me having a research/statistical background really helps when it comes to horizontal/vertical thinking. I can quickly work out how unusual a particular thought is which is a great help when it comes to giving it the attention it deserves.

When you open yourself up to horary thinking and take note of these occurrences, they come to you more frequently and with greater clarity.

I am a late convert to the joys of Bollywood cinema and had been thinking of writing an article on Shahrukh Khan.

What would be the angle though? Connections with other similar film star charts? The transits running through his career? His synastry with his co stars?

When I can’t decide on things like this, I offer it up to the horary thinking method, knowing that there is a power far greater than me that can decide what it wants me to do.

So I asked the I Ching. It was stunningly uninterested about all of the above and many other questions that I asked, until I brought up the question of Shahrukh’s possible reincarnation. The answer to this one was as positive as the others had been negative.

So I googled this and came across someone who claimed that Khan had been a Bengali dancer in a previous life.

The article then went on to suggest that a famous Bollywood love triangle (Amitabh Bachchan and his wife Jaya and co star Rekha) were reincarnations of 19th century American actor Edwin Booth and his own two wives.

So I ran my method of Secondary Regressions over these charts and wrote the article Bach Again

While researching this I looked at the chart of Mary Devlin Booth (Edwin’s first wife and Rekha’s previous claimed incarnation).

For more information I googled Booth and the first thing that came up was another Mary Devlin, an astrologer who I had not previously come across but who had written a book called Astrology And Past Lives.

Regular readers will know that I have little faith in 90% of the things that are written in the name of astrology. 

Much of it is vague, unspecific and a rehashing of commonly agreed notions of what certain placements mean, with very little actual proof in terms of verifiable examples from people’s life experience. 

So when I hear of a book about the astrology of past lives, I am expecting more of the same, not least because these things cannot be proved so they can easily allow the author to give free rein to their own (usually) simplistic astrological opinions.

Astrology And Past Lives does generally follow these pathways. It is mostly commentaries on karmic themes that focus on planets in signs, with a particular emphasis on opposite sign pairings and the supposed kind of work that a soul would be required to do in a life with one of these placements.

There are a number of charts of historical figures with some analysis of the themes that they faced, but in most cases these are general expressions of the natal chart.

Over the years, I have become immune to this kind of information, so I can scan lightly through any astrology book in search of something specific that can be properly tested.

However, there are some examples of charts of people who have used hypnotic regression to reveal their own past lives together with their old birth charts.

On reading it, I realised that horary thinking had led me to this book not least in order to test my own methods of secondary regression.

The very first example offered was of an American astrologer, Sally Kaplan who was sure that she was a reincarnation of a British woman called Claire Clairmonte.

So I applied my method of secondary regressions to this example.

Kaplan’s birthchart in this life has 6 planets forming a Mercury ruled T square, with an apex Mars/Jupiter/Neptune conjunction in the 9th house, so spirituality would be a strong focus for her.

There is very interesting synastry between the charts of Kaplan and Clairemonte.

Both have T Squares involving the Sun, Jupiter, Neptune and an apex Mars.

Claire’s North Node in the 8th house is within a degree of Sally’s Sun.

If there was one placement that would most strongly link to a past life connection in Sally Kaplan’s chart it would be Pluto in Cancer in the 8th house.

If we regress Sally’s chart back to the exact moment of Claire’s birth, the result is astonishing.

Her regressed Sun at 21.20 Capricorn is within half a degree of that Pluto at 21.46 Cancer.

Not only that but her regressed Moon is exactly conjunct it as well.

This Sun/Moon/Pluto connection could not have occurred at any other time between the birthdates of Claire and Sally.

The odds of that kind of connection coming up by chance are over 4,000 to 1 against and has to be seen as a very strong confirmation of my method of secondary regressions as well as Sally Kaplan’s own perceptions of her previous existence.

The second case put forward in the book is of hypnotherapist Richard D Willard who claims to be a reincarnation of the notorious American gangster and bank robber John Herbert Dillinger.

One look at Willard’s chart might be enough to convince us of that kind of connection.

Born on a lunar eclipse in Capricorn with a Sun/Mars conjunction in Cancer across the 2nd and 8th houses, he looks every inch the bank robber.

That 8th house stellium could also be used as evidence of a strong connection with a past life.

Willard’s synastry with Dillinger is again very strong.

Both have Cancer Suns in aspect with Mars.

They also both have a Mutable T square, Willard’s is Jupiter opposite Mercury focusing on an apex Saturn at 22.31 Pisces.

Dillinger has Uranus opposite Pluto focusing onto an apex Jupiter at 22.34 Pisces.

If we regress Richard Willard’s chart back to the birth of John Dillinger, there is nothing particularly special coming up.

His regressed Mars forms a tight square with his Neptune but other than that nothing much.

John Dillinger had a short life, he was shot by FBI agents at the age of 31.

As a young man he was imprisoned for petty crimes and once released at the age of 30, his final year of life saw him engaged in 12 separate bank robberies.

My researches have shown me that one of the strongest themes with secondary regressions relates to the person’s death in a previous life.

This makes total sense as this is the point where any themes or behaviours would be carried over into the next life, particularly if the death was a problematic one.

Richard Willard was born less than two years after John Dillinger’s death, so there wasn’t much opportunity for secondary regressions to take effect.

The only planet that could have moved more than a couple of degrees was the Moon.

At the time of Dillinger’s death, Willard’s regressed Moon had joined his T square.

The bank robberies of Dillinger’s final year would have occurred with Willard’s regressed Mars conjunct his South Node in the 8th house.

While not being as singularly dramatic as the regressions for Sally Kaplan, these directions still have a powerful impact and would certainly point to themes that would be carried over into another life.

After an interesting start, Mary Devlin’s book settles into the kind of Zodiac sign based karmic theme generalities that would probably make interesting reading, but not for me.

As I have mentioned many times, I don’t like the tablets of stone approach to astrology that dominates 90% of the books and articles written about the subject.

The main focus of these is a theoretical, top downward one, always on the chart placements and what this means for the people who have them.

My approach is a research based, let’s look at what’s actually happening in individual people’s lives and see if we can find a symbolic connection to those behaviours and events in the planetary patterns.

And if we are going to take astrology into the impossible to prove area of past lives, it’s even more important to avoid prescriptive tablets of stone theories, even if they owe more to Deepak Chopra than Moses.

In any case a lifetime of serious, devoted research into astrology has time and again showed me that it’s planetary aspects rather than Zodiac signs that actually drive the main themes in people’s lives.

And I have developed the ability to scan astrology books quickly in my search for something of real essence. What I am looking for is a few genuinely stunning examples of our science in action.

And after the best part of 200 pages, I found one, the bizarre sounding claim that the hapless King Sally “may once have been” King Harry (Henry V).

To be fair to Mary Devlin, Astrology And Past Lives was published in 1987, some five years before Pluto’s transit to the then Prince Charles’ Sun had revealed his reincarnation aims to be on quite a different scale.

“Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more, or close the wall up with our English dead”, does not sound as inspiring when said breach is your bit on the side’s lady parts rather than the massed ranks of the French army at Agincourt.

Regular readers would be aware of my views on the current occupier of the British throne, so I have to admit to a healthy dose of scepticism around this claim, but that is not a bad thing.

Any enquiry into proposed reincarnations has to be initially treated in this way, particularly if it’s to do with Henry V, whose previous life one would imagine to be claimed by almost as many people as Napoleon and Cleopatra.

But let’s have a look at Sally’s claims to be the new Harry.

With a 4th house stellium it might be fair to suggest that Charles 111’s own themes come from the past.

In every article I have ever written about him I have stressed how his life has been dominated by his mother because of this and that all seeing Taurus Moon (on the exact degree of Queen Elizabeth’s Sun).

But why would an essentially private Scorpio 4th house Sun person have to come into this world and to play out these themes in front of a global audience.

There must be something before that has contributed to it.

So it’s feasible that he could have reincarnated several times through the British monarchy.

Even if King Harry requires a conceptual quantum jump.

It’s hard to make the connection between a Libra Sun and Cancer Moon and the image of England’s “greatest warrior king”.

But once we look at the aspect patterns, the character whose “outstanding military successes in the Hundred Years’ War against France made England one of the strongest military powers in Europe”, starts to make an appearance.

A Scorpio Ascendant opposite Pluto adds a level of ruthlessness that would be seldom expressed by Librans.

This opposition forms a T square with an apex Jupiter.

A T Square apex planet will always dominate a person’s chart even if it seems to contradict the usual interpretation of their Sun and Moon placements.

An apex Jupiter in Leo in the 9th house is the essence of the Henry V character whose “bravery, and military genius was admired even by contemporary French chroniclers. However, his occasionally cruel temperament and lack of focus regarding domestic affairs have made him the subject of criticism. Nonetheless, his militaristic pursuits during the Hundred Years’ War fostered a strong sense of English nationalism and set the stage for the rise of England to prominence as a dominant global power.”

The last placement you would expect for this kind of character would be the Moon in Cancer, but that just goes to show how easily a T square apex planet can overpower others.

Harry’s synastry with Sally though? On the face of it, you wouldn’t spot it but his whole T Square zeros in on Charles 4th house Scorpio Sun with that Pluto in exact opposition (within a matter of minutes).

The chart for the battle of Agincourt was a powerful one. An exact Grand Trine between Mercury, Uranus and Pluto along with Mercury’s exact square with Saturn and Jupiter’s exact opposition with Neptune, brings all the outer planets into play in a way that often happens for the great turning points in history.

Jupiter was exactly conjunct Harry’s Mars (of course it was).

Uranus formed a Grand Cross with his T Square which means that it was also square to Charles’ own Sun.

So are we really suggesting that the hapless figure who can’t get off his royal arse to cut a ribbon in a factory unless there’s a lunar eclipse was really Henry V in a previous existence?

Lets do the maths.

This is Charles secondary regressed chart dated back to Henry’s time of birth.

To confirm a reincarnation, I would be looking at something very profound going on with the regressed Sun.

At 11.28 Taurus, this SR Sun makes no close contact with anything in his Charles’ current natal chart.

However, it is within half a degree of square to his regressed Pluto at 10.59 Leo, so maybe that is significant.

I have to acknowledge that my studies in the field of secondary regressions are still fairly new and I have yet to identify past lives more than 500 years ago.

So I have tended to focus on regressed to natal placements rather than to other regressed ones. But I will keep an open mind on this one.

In some ways we could see Charles’ own Venus/Neptune conjunction in Libra in the 4th house as being the factor most likely to be connected with his past lives.

So the fact that his regressed Mars makes an exact opposition to his natal Venus may well be an indicator of a connection with Henry V, particularly when we see that Mars is in Aries.

The Moon’s opposition to that Mars is also pointing to a possible connection.

There is also the fact that his regressed Jupiter is within a couple of degrees of his current Sun.

What about Agincourt?

If we regress Charles’ chart back to 1415, we find that Moon/Mars opposition comes up with a 10th/4th house flavour again.

And this time it occurs in Taurus and Scorpio and focuses onto a T square with Saturn that falls right on his current life Ascendant.

Again the regressed Sun isn’t really doing anything, but the rest of the chart does seem to point to an appearance.

What about Henry’s death?

Again nothing of note with the regressed Sun, and this time nothing with the Moon either, but Venus is in the 4th house exactly (within 4 minutes) of his current life Sun. It is also opposite Jupiter.

I feel this Jupiter is the key to it all.

By regressions, Jupiter moves very slowly. In the 550 odd years between Harry and Sally’s births, it has only shifted 35 degrees.

And during the course of Henry V’s life, it was conjunct Charles’ Sun. We would have to go back another 5,000 years for that to happen again.

If we agree with the principle of reincarnation and with the idea that its possible to see some of the themes being carried over from one life to another by looking at the current natal chart, we can see that King Sally’s only chance of appearing as the heroic Harry type figure would have occurred in the early 15th century.

So unlikely as it may sound, that sad figure who’s had to wait until his mid 70s to get an actual job could have stood on that foreign field and uttered those immortal words “Cry God for Harry, England, and Saint George!’”

Charles’ regression back to Agincourt is a possibility. I’m not as certain of it as of Sally Kaplan’s previous appearance as Claire Clairemont, but I have to agree with Mary Devlin that it is possible that he was Henry V.

From champion to tampon seems like a strange direction for reincarnation to take, but who are we to question the wisdom of the soul of King Sally?

I was brought up in a conventional Christian family. Yet I have spent most of my life researching what my former teachers would describe as “the devil’s work”. 

How people can take the most expansive and incomprehensible subject of spirituality and Universal order and reduce it to a series of narrow minded rules with repressive, controlling behaviours is bizarre to say the least.

They say the devil has the best tunes, but it looks like the best ideas as well. 

The discovery of Secondary Regressions is entirely my own, I have never heard of anything like it as a reference to past lives. 

But I can’t own it, I just recognise this technique came to me simply because of my steadily growing capacity to put aside my own horizontal mindset and allow some space for vertical, horary thinking.

And I’m really happy that it coincides with the Devlin’s work. 

Posted on Oct 31st 2024

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