Waite Temperance & Golden Dawn Sun

Abrac

http://s19.postimg.org/7ycwx772b/Temperance_Sun.jpg

I was looking at the Golden Dawn Sun card and noticed some interesting similarities between it and the Waite-Smith Temperance. In the attached image I flipped the GD card so the girl appears on the left rather than the right; I did this only to make it easier to see the similarities. Each card has the same three symbols—water, earth, and solar light. Looking at the GD image it's even easier to understand what Waite probably had in mind for Temperance; the left side, which he calls "psychic," corresponds to the feminine and interior; the right side, or "material," corresponds to the masculine and exterior. In the GD Sun, the two children are symbolically united, symbolised by the clasped hands. The GD description of the Sun in the Practicus initiation says:

"Furthermore, these two children resemble the sign Gemini which unites the Earthy Sign of Taurus with the Watery Sign Cancer, and this sign was, by the Greeks and Romans, referred to Apollo and the Sun."​

Recall Waite's description of Temperance in the PKT:

"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. It is called Temperance, fantastically, because, when the rule of it obtains in our consciousness, it tempers, combines and harmonizes the psychic and material natures."​

Also notice the Waite-Trinick image of the Lovers and compare it to the GD Sun. The Lovers is the card that Waite transplanted to the path Yesod-Tiphareth in the FRC; this path was formerly occupied by Temperance. This is also of interest in light of the fact that in the GD the Lovers corresponds to Gemini.