Dictionary of all Scriptures & Myths

CUPID AND PSYCHE 

Symbols of the indwelling Self and the Emotion-nature. The two eldest daughters of the Archetypal Man (king) are appetite and instinct, born on the astral plane. The third daughter, Emotion (Psyche), is born subjectively on the buddhic plane. Love of form life (Venus) draws, as it were, the Self (Cupid) to effect in the forms union between Emotion and Desire, but the Self is in harmony with buddhic Emotion and nurtures that subjectively (night) during periods of incarnation. Then, when all is prepared, Emotion awakens in the mind, and the Self disappears from consciousness. This constitutes the "fall" of mind and emotion into the lower life of desire and sensation. Love of form life (Venus) enslaves Emotion amid the sufferings and sorrows of the lives on earth. But the indwelling Self (Cupid) "who still loved her in secret, invisibly comforted and assisted her in her toils." As evolution proceeds, the Emotion nature becomes more and more apparent and active in love of righteousness, truth, justice, wisdom, and all the virtues, until at the end of the cycle, love of life in the forms (Venus) is overcome, and the soul rises immortal to be joined with the Self for ever.

"This fable, it is said is a representation of the destiny of the human soul. soul, which is of divine origin, is here below subjected to error in its prison the body. Hence trials and purifications are set before it, that it may become capable of a higher view of things, and of true desire. Two loves meet it,-the earthly, a deceiver who draws it down to earthly things; the heavenly who directs its view to the original, fair and divine, and who, gaining the victory over his rival, leads off the soul as his bride " (HIRT, APUD CREUTZER, Symbolik III. 573). - KEIGHTLEY, Mythology, p. 117.  

See Also

BUDDHI
EROS
LOVE
PANDORA
PERSEPHONE
PRITHA
SELENE
SEPHIROTH
VENUS