The Illustrated Key to the Tarot: The Veil of DivinationDe Laurence, L. W. (Lauron William)
Religion
The Illustrated Key to the Tarot: The Veil of Divination
De Laurence, L. W. (Lauron William)
Fortune-telling by cards; Tarot
is not only essentially slight, because the substitution of
Cups for Hearts, and so forth, constitutes an accidental variation,
but because the presence of a Knight in each of the four suits was
characteristic at one time of many ordinary packs, when this
personage usually replaced the Queen. In the rectified Tarot
which illustrates the present handbook, all numbered cards of the
Lesser Arcana—the Aces only excepted—are furnished with
figures or pictures to illustrate—but without exhausting—the
divinatory meanings attached thereto.
Some who are gifted with reflective and discerning faculties in
more than the ordinary sense—and I am not speaking of clairvoyance—may
observe that in many of the Lesser Arcana there
are vague intimations conveyed by the designs which seem to
exceed the stated divinatory values. It is desirable to avoid misconception
by specifying definitely that, except in rare instances—and
then only by accident—the variations are not to be regarded
as suggestions of higher and extra-divinatory symbolism. I have
said that these Lesser Arcana have not been translated into a
language which transcends that of fortune-telling. I should not
indeed be disposed to regard them as belonging in their existing
forms to another realm than this; but the field of divinatory possibilities
is inexhaustible, by the hypothesis of the art, and the
combined systems of cartomancy have indicated only the bare
heads of significance attaching to the emblems in use. When the
pictures in the present case go beyond the conventional meanings
they should be taken as hints of possible developments along the
same lines; and this is one of the reasons why the pictorial
devices here attached to the four denaries will prove a great help
to intuition. The mere numerical powers and bare words of the
meanings are insufficient by themselves; but the pictures are like
doors which open into unexpected chambers or like a turn in the
open road with a wide prospect beyond.
Section 2
THE LESSER ARCANA
Otherwise, the Four Suits of Tarot Cards, will now be
described according to their respective classes by the pictures to
each belonging, and a harmony of their meanings will be provided
from all sources.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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