Temperance (XIV)
The Angel and the Wing as the central motif, with the Vessel, the Triangle and the Pyramid, the Sun and the Moon and the Crown in a secondary part. From The 1909 tarot.
Key · 5 motifs
Tap a motif on the picture, or a line below. Its note opens under the line, with the reading its author gave it.
- Primary motif
- Secondary motifs · 4
The picture
A winged angel in white, a sun sign on the brow and a triangle within a square on the breast, pours water between two cups, one foot on the land and one in the pool; irises at the water's edge; a path leads to mountains and a crown of light; the Angel as the central motif, the Vessel, the Triangle, the Sun and the Crown by eye. By eye
Readings quoted
Waite, 1911 “All the conventional emblems are renounced herein. So also are the conventional meanings, which refer to changes in the seasons, perpetual movement of life and even the combination of ideas.”
Waite, 1911 “Under that rule we know in our rational part something of whence we came and whither we are going.”
Decoded: every motif is marked, and each mark carries the reading its author gave it, quoted from the text, or says that it is observed on the picture and not read. The composition, the picture read whole, comes with the entry.
No entry yet for this motif. The wall gathers every work that carries it.
By eye The central motif, the angel.
Waite, 1911 “I speak of him in the masculine sense, but the figure is neither male nor female.”
Waite, 1911 “It is, moreover, untrue to say that the figure symbolizes the genius of the sun, though it is the analogy of solar light, realized in the third part of our human triplicity.”
Waite, 1911 “It is called Temperance fantastically, because, when the rule of it obtains in our consciousness, it tempers, combines and harmonises the psychic and material natures.”
No entry yet for this motif. The wall gathers every work that carries it.
By eye A secondary motif, the two cups and the water between them.
Waite, 1911 “It is held to be pouring the essences of life from chalice to chalice.”
Waite, 1911 “It has one foot upon the earth and one upon waters, thus illustrating the nature of the essences.”
No entry yet for this motif. The wall gathers every work that carries it.
By eye A secondary motif, within a square, on the breast.
Waite, 1911 “A winged angel, with the sign of the sun upon his forehead and on his breast the square and triangle of the septenary.”
Gold, the perfected metal, and the illuminated intellect. The most overloaded symbol in the tradition.
By eye A secondary motif, the sign on the brow.
Waite, 1911 “A winged angel, with the sign of the sun upon his forehead and on his breast the square and triangle of the septenary.”
Completion, and in the Kabbalistic reading the first sephirah, the point at which the work is no longer yours.
By eye A secondary motif, seen in the light over the path, at the left.
Waite, 1911 “A direct path goes up to certain heights on the verge of the horizon, and above there is a great light, through which a crown is seen vaguely. Hereof is some part of the Secret of Eternal Life, as it is possible to man in his incarnation.”
Also carrying the Angel and the Wing
15 works, 6 with it as the central motif. The symbol.
Two Peasants Hold a Red Robe, Mercury Rests on the Water Below
The Cherub of Ezekiel
Melencolia I
Plate 43 from "Los Caprichos": The sleep of reason produces monsters (El sueño de la razon produce monstruos)
Angel of the Revelation (Book of Revelation, chapter 10)
Judgement (XX)
The Virgin with a Dragon at Her Feet
The Hand of the Mysteries
Also carrying the Vessel
7 works. The symbol.
Also carrying the Triangle and the Pyramid
5 works. The symbol.
Also carrying the Sun and the Moon
15 works. The symbol.
Also carrying the Crown
8 works. The symbol.
In the same series
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