and woman--and so on. A close inter-relation is always seen to subsist
between corresponding members of such pairs of opposites: sun, day,
fire, man express and embody the primal and active aspect of the
manifesting deity; moon, night, water, woman, its secondary and
passive aspect. Moreover, each implies or brings to mind the others
of its class: man, like the sun, is lord of day; he is like fire, a
devastating force; woman is subject to the lunar rhythm; like water,
she is soft, sinuous, fecund.

The part which this polarity plays in the arts is important, and the
constant and characteristic distinction between the two terms is a
thing far beyond mere contrast.

In music they are the major and minor modes: the typical, or
representative chords of the dominant seventh, and of the tonic (the
two chords into which Schopenhauer says all music can be resolved): a
partial dissonance, and a consonance: a chord of suspense, and a chord
of satisfaction. In speech the two are vowel, and consonant sounds:
the type of the first being _a_, a sound of suspense, made with the
mouth open; and of the second _m_, a sound of satisfaction, made by
closing the mouth; their combination forms the sacred syllable Om
(_Aum_). In painting they are warm colors, and cold: the pole of
the first being in red, the color of fire, which excites; and of the
second in blue, the color of water, which calms; in the Arts of design
they are lines straight (like fire), and flowing (like water); masses
light (like the day), and dark (like night). In architecture they are
the column, or vertical member, which resists the force of gravity;
and the lintel, or horizontal member, which succumbs to it; they are
vertical lines, which are aspiring, effortful; and horizontal lines,
which are restful to the eye and mind.