Strength: flowers and a subdued lion

One hand on the jaws, a lion gone quiet

In Part II Waite titles the card "Strength, or Fortitude". He writes: a woman, over whose head broods a "symbol of life", is closing the jaws of a lion. The only point where this design differs from the conventional presentations is that her beneficent fortitude has already subdued the lion, which is being led by a chain of flowers. He adds that, for reasons that satisfy himself, the card has been interchanged with Justice, which is usually numbered eight; this site follows the Rider-Waite-Smith numbering: Strength 8, Justice 11.

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Strength: a woman cradles the muzzle of a closed-eyed lion.

On the original Rider-Waite-Smith card the numeral VIII sits at the top, under a yellow sky. The woman wears a white gown and a flower wreath, with a horizontal figure 8 hovering over her head; she bends a little and rests both hands on the lion's mouth. The lion is red-orange, head lowered, tongue out, and a garland of flowers joins it to her; a blue mountain stands far off.

The picture holds one point of contact, one chain and one sign: hands on the mouth, a garland between the two, the figure 8 above.

What Waite lists: power, energy, action, and not one negative word

Waite's divinatory meanings read: power, energy, action, courage, magnanimity; also complete success and honours. Reversed: despotism, abuse of power, weakness, discord, sometimes even disgrace.

Power, energy, action, courage, magnanimity; also complete success and honours. Reversed: Despotism, abuse of power, weakness, discord, sometimes even disgrace.

Flowers, lion and the sign overhead: what is said, what is inferred

Waite's Part II comment on this card carries a caution from the author himself: the higher meanings are "matters of inference", and he does not suggest "that they are transparent on the surface of the card". So it pays to read them apart.

How to read it: grooming a cat that dreads nail clipping, start from what has yielded

The card's picture is a scene already settled: a hand on the jaws, a chain of flowers, a lion with its head lowered. Carry it to a pet at home: a cat that struggles every time the nails are clipped.

1. 1

   Where does the hand rest?

   In the picture the hands are in one place only: the lion's mouth. For the cat, pick a single point of contact as well, say holding one paw first; keep the hand in the same spot and the pressure the same each time.

2. 2

   Is the chain flowers or iron?

   Waite calls the chain a "sweet yoke". Write down the restraints you use now: holding down, shouting, shutting the cat in a crate are iron; a fixed time, the same cue and a treat afterward are flowers. A chain of flowers is something the cat can bear every day.

3. 3

   What has already yielded?

   Waite writes of the lion after it is subdued, and no struggle is drawn. Find what the cat already accepts, begin there, and push only one small step further.

An example: the cat lets you touch its paws but runs when it sees the clippers. Put the three questions on one table:

Reversed and neighboring cards: after "sometimes even", three cards that put force elsewhere

In Waite's reversed words, despotism and abuse of power speak of force pushed too far, weakness of force falling short, and discord and disgrace look more like consequences; the directions do not agree. When you read a reversal, ask first which direction you are taking.