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TWELVE PHASES OF HUMAN EXPERIENCE: SAGITTARIUS
With the Sign Sagittarius the Night-force which increased in power since the summer solstice is coming to its high-mark. The power that strove mightily through Libra and Scorpio to expand man's horizon and man's feelings is now operating almost unchallenged by the opposite trend of the Day-force, now at its lowest ebb. Collectivism overpowers individualism. Society dominates over personality; the far, over the near.
It is the age of great adventures into the vast unchartered realms of generalizations, of religion and philosophy, of abstraction and metaphysics. It is the time of Crusades and pilgrimages burning with the intensity of the quest for God, the quest for eternal values valid anywhere and at any time, the quest for absolutes. It is the age of social movements and of fanaticism, of martyrdom and intolerance; when men lose the sense of the earth, the narrow feelings of self-preservation and security, the will to personal happiness and soar on the wings of self-denial toward distant social or mystical ideals, for which they are glad to die.
The logic of the process of development of social consciousness which asserted itself through Libra behavior and Scorpio emotions leads man, in Sagittarius, to new mental horizons. Whereas in the opposite zodiacal Sign, Gemini, man was trying eagerly to build a tight web of close connections a nervous system, an intellectual system of logic, a technique of experiments to satisfy his curiosity about phenomena surrounding him in Sagittarius the individual, completely absorbed by social or mystical factors, searches for distant connections. These connections will serve as the "nervous system" of the social organism, to the realization of which he is now dedicated. They will be, for instance, a network of telephonic and telegraphic lines; more abstractly still, a system of laws, ordinances, regulations which will enable the complex organism of society the life of a city or nation to operate satisfactorily.
Connections, close or distant, mean intelligence and mental activities. Thus Gemini and Sagittarius are "mental" Signs. The former represents mind functioning within the lesser sphere of personality; the latter, mind operating within the greater sphere of society. In both cases the mental activities are direct and constructive. On the contrary, in Virgo (and we shall see later, in Pisces), the mind acts in a destructive, critical and, if all goes well, regenerative manner.
Mind as the final stage of the rise of either the Day-force or the Night-force is a builder. It synthetizes, extends and brings to their culmination and maximum radiance the energies of the Day and Night zodiacal tides. This is mind in the stages just before the solstices. But mind in the zodiacal Signs preceding the equinoxes is an entirely different kind of power. It is a power which clears up the stage for a new kind of activity, which denies and cleanses, which says constantly: "Not this! Not this!" It is mind telling you what should be forgotten, left behind, overcome and transcended. In Virgo, the personal emotionalism and the dramatic self-indulgence of Leo is to be curbed by self-discipline, hygiene, self-immolation to a Teacher. In Pisces, it is the social excitement, the exaggerated idealism, the mystic fantasies and delusions of Aquarius which have to be analyzed away. The illusion of the "glory" of God must be transcended so that what the true mystics called the "poverty" of God, the silent and bare reality of the Presence of God, may be experienced in personality and in actuality.
In Sagittarius, man seeks to put in working order what he experienced with great depths of feelings in Scorpio. During the latter stage of his zodiacal journey the individual sought to merge with others in intimate and poignantly real union, that he might become more than himself and identify himself with the throbbing life of some greater organism. Greater organism may have meant at first the "Two-as-One" realization produced by the ecstasy of sex-fulfillment beyond any thought for progeny and self-reproduction. But the typical "greater organism" is the social group (or the occult Lodge), with the life of which the Scorpio type identifies himself in feelings, and of which he often becomes an unconscious mouthpiece destructive or constructive according to the nature of the group's animating energies and purpose.
Scorpio is a Sign of power, and power seeks always a higher level from which it may be fed, in order that it may flow to a lower level at which it may operate as fecundator and ruler. In Sagittarius, power is already built in. Man has identified himself with the group with society or any other kind of organic life vaster than his own. He has power to use. With that power he can build. By harnessing it he may travel far and wide.
In ancient symbolism we see Sagittarius represented by the Centaur, the mythical creature, half-horse and half-man, shooting his arrows heavenward. To say that the symbol describes a struggle between the human and animal natures is to say little for the struggle between opposite energies goes on through the entire Zodiac. The real significance of the symbol is deeper and more precise. In every land, the horse represents virile power; but power of a special kind, power with which man can identify himself, which he can mount and with the help of which he can expand his range of activity. This he cannot do with the Bulls power, for the latter is unconscious, untamable, pure instinct the power of cosmic Desire which man can kill by the sword (bull fights), but never consciously use for his own development. Taurus is therefore cosmic sex-power. Man is its tool, until he kills it by asceticism (the Buddha-symbol of energy overcoming).
Not so with the Sagittarius type of sex. That kind of power can be tamed and used. It becomes then symbolized by the Horse. Drinking the mare's milk gives great vitality and is used for that purpose in Russia and Asia. Identifying oneself with the stallion's power is a world-wide symbol of becoming recharged with power for use whether it be destructive use (Genghis Khan's"Golden Hordes" riding on their fierce Mogul horses) or constructive use. The Sagittarius type therefore has become identified with power power that burns in the "groins" and is centered, in Yoga, in the region of the solar plexus; a fact which the psychoanalyst also recognizes as he interprets dreams of horses of various colors. Half of Sagittarius is "power"; the other half is "he who uses power" that is, the conscious mind of man. A third attribute (bow and arrows) refers to direction and purpose. The Centaur shoots upward at a 45° angle, symbol of the maximum mobilization of energies.
The centaurs were sons of Gaia, the Earth. In other words, they were the products of an identification with the energies of that greater organism, the planet. In Sagittarius, man having identified himself with the power generated by society and by the complex interchange between human beings (sex, business, commerce, art, propaganda, etc.) has become "powerful." His problem is how to direct it in the proper channels. The Sagittarian's problem does not refer essentially to a struggle between two natures; it deals with a choice of directions for the power which has been built in within his "groins." And the Centaur symbolism indicates what the correct direction is, by the angle at which the Centaur shoots his arrows.
The Sagittarius type is occupied mainly with "working efficiency" and direction. He is the typical manager of power; the "man-agent" of power. For the manager is the person who directs and organizes the release of power for maximum efficiency and minimum waste; also for greatest speed and greatest reach. On the other hand, the typical "executive" is developed essentially in Capricorn, because the executive is the symbol of the working, organization as a whole, in its relation to society as a whole. He is the center and symbol of the State. Sagittarius is the Prime Minister; Capricorn, the King or Emperor and Aquarius, the Reformer.
The Sagittarian mentality is a very coherent and cohesive kind of mentality thus its stubborn and unyielding quality. It sees everything in terms of "schedule of operation" or law. It is also, at another level, completely obsessed by ethics; but ethics as a working system of human relationship and not as an idealist's dream. The Sagittarian is not primarily an idealist. He wants to extend that which is; to organize it and make it work by finding all possible connections between every part of the whole and by seeing them operate properly. He is interpreter, rather than inventor of new goals. He codifies. He finds new meanings, new dimensions of thinking. He clears up obscure points. He pierces through veil after veil. But he does not lose himself, like the Scorpio and even more the Aquarius type, into wild identifications with boundless energies or mystical realizations. He never surrenders the sense of boundaries, of form, of a definite rhythm of operation. He is not Eagle, but Horse. His power stems from the reality of the known and the experienced. He may shoot arrows at the stars, but his feet remain on the earth, which he loves because it is the source of his power.
It is the source of his power; but he is not bound to it. He uses it. He manages its power. He treats it well, just as a Mogul warrior or a nomad treats well his horses; merely because he knows he is dependent upon it for maximum efficiency, in fact for his very life. Therefore the Sagittarian is keen on exercising his body and muscles, on feeling the soil under his feet; keen also on working with people, in getting the feel of society; despondent and fretful if alone, or (in the less mental type) if confined in a narrow environment. He needs open space, large rooms. He loves to organize other people's lives with often unpleasant results! He loves to handle power and to speed.
In modern life the automobile and the tank are taking the place of the horse. What is the source of their power? Oil deep in the "bowels of the earth." And so leaders like Churchill and General de Gaulle who were the first to recognize the value of the tank in modern warfare are Sagittarians; and so the birth-chart of the United States, the land of the automobiles, outdoors and sports, has most likely Sagittarius rising.
At a higher level, we find Sagittarius associated with religion; but only with organized religion and rituals. Religion, as an organized social force, is born of the individual's yearning for psychic identification with the wholeness of the community's life. It is a communal enterprise, powered by men's yearning to feel collectively united. Priests and theocratic rulers are the managers of that communal energy. The Prophet gives form to it. He creates "images of salvation" symbols of unification. He projects himself as such a symbol. He becomes a mythical Personage, a Solar Hero. He is the soul of the community. He is humanity condensed into One Perfect Man; the projection of the very Fatherhood of God.
As to the philosopher and metaphysician also a product of Sagittarian activity such a one is he who establishes workable order in the midst of the bewildering complexity of social and natural phenomena. He does this by recognizing all sorts of hidden connections and correlations between events; by interpreting and formulating generalizations in terms of laws. He travels in the "realm of Ideas." But he travels with the use of the power he released by identifying himself with the need of his group. Nothing has more significance to the higher type of Sagittarian than the "need of the times" the need of the community to which he belongs. To realize that need and to become identified with it are the very sources of his power as a thinker, seer and formulator. He is that need having taken form and name. He is interpreter, reader of omens and "signs of the times," planner, prophet and seer. But what he "sees" is what there is a social need for him to see. He is the servant of the community.
On the negative side of the picture we find the Sagittarian as a fanatic and as a Puritan (and the Puritan background of the American tradition again stresses a Sagittarian Ascendant for the United States). Just because the personalizing energy of the Day-force is at its lowest ebb in Sagittarius, the native of that sign has very little regard for individuals. He willingly sacrifices anything personal and individualistic to the altar of the "good of the community." The Spanish Inquisition is a typical Sagittarian product (Spain is ruled by Sagittarius), for it tortured the individual personality to save the soul. It sacrificed the near to the far. Scorpio's frustrations may also lead to Sagittarian fanaticism, which then becomes more violent and cruel through sadistic features. The community accordingly has not only the right to save itself at the cost of its individuals' sufferings and deaths; the man who claims the right to manage that religious-social power finds a perverse exaltation in the torture. Thus personal asceticism (deliberate or enforced) leads to cruelty.
The Sagittarian has so vague an objective and positive sense of individualism, and on the other hand such an overwhelming social sense, that he has at times to resort to subconscious subterfuges and to the thrill of violence in order to get back a feeling of his own personality. In fact he does this rather often as a rule, especially as the chaos of medieval and modern society fills him with destructive energies. Thus the Sagittarian may seem on the surface to be a boisterous individual and an arrogant personality. This, again, is due to his very surrender to non-individualistic forces. The Day-force at its lowest point of power has to strain itself in order to give to itself the illusion of strength. It needs "strong meat" to be aroused, and when aroused it acts at times in archaic and compulsive ways which are just as unpleasant as the negative Scorpio traits, and perhaps more dangerous because more sharpened by intellectual mechanisms. Then Jupiterian compassion becomes more or less unconscious sadism.
Sagittarius is the prelude to Christmas. As the snow, it absorbs all littleness into the vast womb of silence from which the new birth of the Day-force will emerge. The mind that binds all life into patterns of cosmic relationships has become a "mother of the Living God." The Sagittarian has all the heroisms, the self-abnegation and the loving tyranny of mothers. He closes an era and opens another. He is pregnant with divinity.
