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General Book of the Tarot, by A. E. Thierens, [1930], at sacred-texts.com
TRADITION: Utility, advantage, serviceableness, profit, interest, gain, importance, necessity. Reversed it is said to give: Repose, tranquillity, apathy, inertia, idleness, discouragement; also recreation, etc.
THEORY: The Fire on the Eighth and on the Fourth house, personified. The traditional renderings are not bad but far from complete. The eighth
house is that of our debts, money of other people and of the dead in particular. So the querent may profit by legacies or inheritance. Consequently the benefic influence on the weak point in our material conditions may be interpreted as: advantage, interest, etc. But the knight is always a personification, too, and this is not given in the traditional interpretation. We must see him as a person who is obliging, carrying out a will, coming to the aid of the querent, secretly or confidentially perhaps, at least not publicly, visiting him in his house, saving him from material and financial troubles. It may be a loan, inheritance or advance, but without any hard conditions connected with it, so it may be a present. On the other hand the houses mentioned give the tendency to retire from the outer world; this accounts for renderings such as 'inactivity, inertia,' etc. . . . We should say, it means the tendency to enjoy the good things of the heart(s) within one's own private or family circle, in repose, in some retreat, secretly. In weak cases there may be some danger of degeneration into idleness or indolence, etc. In connection with the fourth house, ruling family matters and the past, the home and the storehouse (of memory, e.g.) the card must have to do with pleasant memories, recollections, people we have known before; collections and collecting.
CONCLUSION: A good help, discreet aid in financial difficulties, paying of debts; advantage, interest, etc. And the person who brings these to the querent. Loan, inheritance, advance, present. Happy memories, collections and collecting, recollection; savings. Persons whom we have known before or who stand in a nearer
relation to us than is known or announced publicly. In weak cases: indolence, secret enjoyment, idleness, stagnation, etc.
