The Five Streams in the Ace of Cups

Abrac

In Azoth, or, the Star in the East, after describing what Waite calls the First and Second Sublimations, he has this to say on p. 202:

"When by the consistent application of these two rules we shall have become elevated and imbued with the generosity and nobility, become liberated in the grand manumission, and enlightened by the illumination of a clear, disabused, and undeluded mind, we shall enter into the fruition of five refined qualities of consolation—(a) The intellectual message of Nature, which is truly Protean in that it can be adapted to interpretation after a thousand manners, and therefore does more than preach sermons since indeed it imparts revelations, with commentaries of infinite suggestions. (b) The intellectual message of romance, for the transfiguration of mind is the evaporation of the commonplace. (c) The intellectual message of poetry, which is the romance of aspiration, desire, motive, and activity at the elevation of white heat. (d) The intellectual message of philosophy, which will no longer be dead but living, no longer arid but fruitful, and the consolation of this message will be deeper than was dreamed by Boetius, for we shall possess the key which will open all its treasures, and the instrument which will separate the living gold of all systems, so that we can be garnished and enriched by them all. (e) The intellectual message of parable and allegory will finally constitute the whole universe as a wise instruction towards the creation of the interior kingdom of light. Like a five-fold fountain of living water, these consolations will continually refresh our minds; by them shall we also be illuminated as with the radiation of a burning pentagram. So shall we desire more and more the quickening of intelligence; so shall we be prepared by receptivity towards higher truth; so will our intellectual forces in all things make for God; so shall we hunger after the supernatural, thirst for the world beyond, die unto outward things, that again, after another manner, they may be renewed alive in us; so will all the forces of our nature, as of all Nature, propel us towards the life within, and we shall enter into that which is beyond contemplation, beyond trance, and the love and life of God shall encompass us, loving and living, when we dare the withdrawn mystery.​

It's probably coincidental, but it may be of interest to those curious about such things—the last two words of this paragraph start with W & M. ;)

I'm beginning to think the Waite-Smith deck was designed to illustrate this book—seriously.