1. Life. — Nostradamus was born Dec. 14, 1503, in the quaint old town of St. Kemy, in Provence, which is now included in the Department of Bouches-du-Khone. His family was reputed to be of Jewish descent, and of the tribe of Issachar, wherefore they predicted his gift of prophecy. His father, Jacques Xostre-dame, w-as notary of St. Remy. His mother Renee's grandfathers had been noted for their knowledge of mathematics and physics, which, in the earlier part of the 15th century, meant chiefly astrology, alchemy, and magic. One of these grandparents had been physician, or wonder-worker, to the weak but ami- able Rene, titular king of Jerusalem and the Two Sici- lies, and count of Provence. The other had lield the same rcsponsil)le position with Rene's son, John, the daring and adventurous duke of Calabria. From his maternal grandfather, the son of one of these court- leeches and star-gazers, the young Michael received his first instructions in mathematics, after whose death he was sent to school at Avignon. Thence he proceeded to Montpellier to study pliilosophy and medicine. From this great medical school he proceeded to Narbonne, Toulouse, and Burdeaux in succession. At Bordeaux he commenced the practice of his profession when he was twenty-two years of age. P'our years later, in 1529, he returned to IMnntpcllier to obtain his degree, which he took with great distinction. Going thence to Toulouse,
he was induced to remain there by the residence in that place of his familiar friend, Julius Cresar Scaliger. Here he contracted a respectable marriage, and had two chil- dren. In a very few years his wife and children all died, and he became a wanderer in Italy and Sicily. In 1544 he married a second time, and settled at Salon ; but in 1546 he was retained, at the public expense, by the city of Aix to minister to the sufferers by the plague, which was again raging with great violence. After three years thus honorably employed he returned to Salon de Craux. His life appears to have always been respectable, and surrounded with respectable associa- tions, though often vagrant. His home, however, con- tinued henceforth to be at Salon ; and here his family of three sons and a daughter was brought up.
Nostradamus acquired his first oracular reputation by the production of almanacs, in which " he did so admi- rably hit the conjuncture of events that he was sought for far and near," like an African rain -doctor. The popularity and success of these almanacs threatened to be damaging to the fame they had acquired for him. They tempted the ingenious fraternity of booksellers to vend spurious almanacs with the attraction of his name. This gave him occasion to complain that many false prophecies had been fathered upon him ; and his eulo- gist, M. de Garencieres, believed that it furnished the foundation for the piquant epigram of Etienne Jodelle, his contemporary :
"Nostra damns, cum falsa damns, nam fallere nostrum
est: Et, cum falsa damts, nil nisi Nostradamus."
Nevertheless, the supposed familiarity of Nostradamus with the secrets of futurity was largely bruited about, and readih' believed in the credulous and nefarious age of Catherine de' Medici. The confidence of Nostrada- mus in his own miraculous gifts was strengthened ; and he employed his time in completing and pre]>aring for the press the first series of his Centuries of Prophecy. It was published at Lyons in 1555, and was preceded by a Preface, dated March 1, of that year. The work contains the singular and very ambiguous prediction of the remarkable death of Henry II by the lance of Mout- gomerj', which hajipened more than four years later. It cannot be imagined that this was deemed applicable at the time of its appearance to the king, who was in the vigor of manhood. But the fame of Nostradamus, either through his almanacs or his Centuries, reached the ears of the court, and he received an invitation from Henry to visit the royal abode. On his arrival he was treated with great consideration, was liberally compensated for his fatigues, and was sent to Blois, to see the royal princes and to report upon their destinies. Having sat- isfied the curiosity and secured the favor of the crown, Nostradamus returned to Salon, and employed himself in the manufacture of more oracles. In the course of the ensuing two years he completed his Ten Centuries, corresponding to the ten ages of the Sibyl, by adding three more Centuries to the seven hundred prophecies first published. These additional Centuries have the merit of surpassing their rude predecessors in obscurity, triviality, and apparent aimlessness. They were dedi- cated to Henrj' II in what is called by his English trans- lator a " Summary Epistle," which is dated June 27, 1558. This dedication is marked by even greater assur- ance than its predecessor. Its tone is more confident, its pretensions loftier, and its indications more un- meaning.
These thousand prophecies constituted only a part of the oracular calculations of Nostradamus. He refers to fuller declarations in his "other prophecies, written in soluta oratione,'' or prose. These prose predictions, how- ever, never saw the light, except such as were intro- duced into his almanacs. The assertion of their exist- ence may have been only a convenient provision for the manufacture of metrical vaticinations after the occur- rences had transpired to which they were to be applied. It certainly afforded a tempting and plausible foundation