Do Scorpios cause their own accidents and infirmities?

In a recent meeting of a group of astrologers studying William Lilly, we came across an aphorism which Lilly employed to judge medical issues in astrological charts: “When you find Scorpio Ascending, you may for the most part judge, the party was cause of his own infirmness, either by peevishness, folly, choler or the like; and your judgment will be more firm if Mars be then placed in Scorpio.” (CA p.152)

At first glace this seemed like an odd statement. Why was Lilly picking on Scorpio of all the 12 signs of the zodiac? My first thought was that maybe at some time in his life Lilly had dated a woman with Scorpio rising and Mars in the that sign. Dismissing that thought, I pondered Lilly’s comment a bit and realized that if Scorpio is rising, then Aries will be found in the 6th house of illness and probably on its cusp, so that Mars will signify the body and vital force of the native as well as his or her infirmities, injuries and accidents, which gives the native agency over his or her own ailments. Lilly must have viewed people with Scorpio on the Ascendant and Mars affecting the Ascendant as being prone to peevishness (querulous, fretful, obstinate), folly (tragically foolish, lacking good sense) and choler (hot-tempered. irascible).

What interested me about Lilly’s aphorism is the way in which he combined several conditions into a single meaningful statement, namely:

Mars occupies Scorpio.Mars occupies the 1st house (the body and its vital force).Mars rules the 1st house.Mars also rules the 6th house (accidents, injuries, illness), which has Mars-ruled Aries on the cusp.[He did not include the fact that Mars, by exaltation, rules Capricorn on the cusp of the 3rd house (short trips), but this may be relevant in the example cited next.]

It would be interesting to study charts of notable people who have Scorpio rising and Mars in Scorpio. I did a quick search and found that the actress and princess Grace Kelly met Lilly’s criteria. Here is her chart from astro.com.

I don’t know much about Grace Kelly’s health issues or whether she was, in fact, the cause of her own infirmities. She died tragically in a car accident in 1982. This accident is prefigured in her chart by 3rd-ruler Saturn, the contrary-to-sect malefic, in square to Uranus, which conjoins the 6th house cusp. Saturn in Sagittarius is also disposed by Jupiter Rx and in detriment in Gemini in the 8th house. The 8th-ruler Mercury (travel) conjoins the South Lunar Node in the 1st house near the Ascendant. Here is the account of the accident from wikipedia:

“On September 13, 1982, Grace suffered a mild cerebral hemorrhage while driving back to Monaco from her country home in Roc Agel. As a result, she lost control of her 1971 Rover P6 3500 and drove off the steep, winding road and down the 120-foot (37 m) mountainside. Her teenage daughter Stéphanie, who was in the passenger seat, tried but failed to regain control of the car. The Princess was taken to the Monaco Hospital (later named the Princess Grace Hospital Centre) with injuries to the brain and thorax and a fractured femur. She died the following night at 10:55 p.m. after Rainier decided to turn off her life support.”

According to a 2019 article in Town&County, Princess Grace was driving her daughter to the train station because 17-year-old Stephanie was about to start school in Paris. The article continues:

“Grace’s chauffeur brought out the princess’s 11-year-old Rover, and offered to drive, but Grace insisted that she could do so, as they couldn’t fit three people in the car with the luggage. About two miles outside of La Turbie, Grace missed a particularly sharp turn, sending the car over a 120-foot slope.” (Bold and italics mine).

If Grace had allowed her chauffeur to drive and if she had had a mild cerebral hemorrhage on the way to the train station, the accident might not have happened and the chauffeur could have taken her to get medical attention. Her insistence that she drive instead of him led directly to the accident and the injuries to which she succumbed, so maybe Lilly does have a point. On the other hand, Grace Kelly’s public persona was not of a peevish, choleric and foolish woman. Could she have displayed such traits in her private life?