In the Sign of Sagittarius is the Third Grade,
this being not a burning heat,
and under the Rule or Order of Rest and Pause.
Plates 19-22 represent the Elements: Fire, Water, Air, and Earth.
It begins the Third Grade in the Sign of Sagittarius, the diurnal sign of Jupiter, a Fire sign. From there we proceed to Pisces (Plate 20), the nocturnal sign of Jupiter, a Water sign. The Third Grade is under the Rule of Rest and Pause, the Winter Solstice (sol = Sun, stit = to stand still). Plate 21 aligns with Aquarius, the diurnal sign of Saturn, an Air sign. And we end with Capricorn (Plate 22), the nocturnal sign of Saturn, an Earth sign.
“The Spirit dissolves the body,
and in the Dissolution extracts the Soul of the Body,
and [in the Coagulation] changes this body into Soul,
and [in the Sublimation/Distillation] the Soul is changed into Spirit,
and [in the Conjunction] the Spirit is added again to the Body, for thus it has stability.”
The Third Alchemical Marriage is complete; the Divine Spark crosses the Veil of Reflection.
The Greek mythology of Dionysus aligns well with the last four Plates of Splendor Solis. Dionysus is a resurrection deity, with similarities to other resurrection deities, such as Tammuz, Marduk, and Osiris. Several variants of the Dionysus’ myths exist (some of them contradictory). The version that relates best to these Plates begins with Zeus seducing Semele.
Semele, though the daughter of a goddess (Harmonia), is mortal. Hera (Zeus’ jealous wife) convinced the pregnant Semele to force Zeus to prove his identity to her, by appearing in all his glory. When Zeus appeared in his true form, Semele was incinerated, the Nigredo phase. Athena saved the heart of the fetus and delivered it to Zeus, who sewed it in his thigh to finish gestating. After Dionysus was born, Zeus gave him the thunderbolts of power. Hera had Titans distract Dionysus from his thunderbolts with seven toys. (Different authors included different toys, but some of the toys can easily be aligned with the Planets: knucklebones for Mercury, a mirror for the Moon, the bullroarer for Jupiter, etc.) In some versions, the Titans applied ash to disguise their faces. In other versions, the Titans are turned to ash, but later in the story. Ash indicates the Albedo phase.
Once Dionysus no longer had his thunderbolts, the Titans dismember Dionysus, first boiling and then roasting the pieces of his body before consuming them. Zeus discovered the Titans eating Dionysus. He blasted them with a thunderbolt, turning them to ash. Dionysus, being boiled and then roasted, is a humid and then a dry purification, so the Citrinitas phase.
In some versions of Dionysus’ myths, Rhea (Zeus’ mother) is able to put Dionysus back together, resurrecting him. This is the Rubedo phase.
(In other versions, the ashes, which contain the parts of Dionysus’ which the Titans ate, were mixed with the clay that Prometheus used to fashion men, so men contain a piece of divinity, a Divine Spark. As men purify themselves and evolve back toward Kether, the outer layers of the Material Body, and then the Etheric Body, and then the Astral Body, etc., are removed, until finally it will just be a Divine Spark. And when all the Divine Sparks have been purified and can conjunct, Dionysus will be resurrected.)