Mystic rectangle

A mystic rectangle is a figure of four bodies joined by six aspects: two oppositions, bound to each other by two trines and two sextiles. Drawn on the wheel, the four points mark the corners of a rectangle, and the two oppositions are its diagonals. Every body in it opposes one of the others, trines a second and sextiles the third.

Each of those aspects has its own nature. An opposition faces two bodies across the wheel, in signs that share much and clash on the rest. Its strain usually shows up in dealings with others, where part of oneself is seen in someone else. Fought as an outside enemy, it stays a struggle; owned as part of oneself, it turns into insight and the ability to work together.

A trine joins bodies usually in signs of the same element. The two flow together without effort and can steady a person after upheaval, though that ease can also harden into habit. A sextile, usually between signs of compatible elements, opens a chance that pays only when some effort goes into it; ignored, the chance simply waits.

In a mystic rectangle these do not act one by one. Modern practice reads any aspect figure as a single whole rather than leg by leg. We read the oppositions as this figure's driving force: trines and sextiles alone can sit still, and the two oppositions put them under tension and keep them moving. Each opposition also has easier routes running beside it. The two bodies pulling against each other are both linked to the other pair, one by trine and one by sextile, so the tension has channels to move through.

The figure therefore runs two ways. Used well, the strain of the oppositions keeps the easy aspects from going slack, and the easy aspects give the strain somewhere to go. Used poorly, the oppositions are lived as quarrels with other people, while the trines and sextiles are coasted on or ignored.

Its subject comes from the bodies at its corners and their signs, because what each body signifies decides what the rectangle is about. Close aspects make it count for more than wide ones. Because it joins four bodies, it weighs more than a figure of three. In a birth chart, a moving body that touches one corner tends to stir all four at once.

The classical configurations each join just two signs, and no shape built from several bodies appears among them. We follow modern practice here.