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Mercury and Pluto · mind and depth
Mercury in aspect to Pluto
Pluto is what lies underneath, and Mercury is the faculty that investigates. Their contact produces a penetrating intelligence. Surfaces are distrusted on principle, motives are read behind statements, and the person is drawn to research, psychology, forensics or any subject that requires digging past the official account. Concentration is intense and can amount to obsession with whatever has taken hold. Speech carries weight and, when it chooses to, considerable force. Secrets are kept easily. The risk running alongside the gift is suspicion: assuming a hidden layer where there was only an ordinary surface.
What each planet brings
| Mercury | thinking, speech, learning |
|---|---|
| Pluto | power, depth, regeneration |
The soft aspects (trine or sextile)
A trine or a sextile gives depth of mind without much strain. Research is thorough, insight into people is accurate and usually kind in its use, and difficult subjects can be studied without being taken personally. Persuasion comes naturally. The unexamined edge is influence: a mind this capable of getting under someone's assumptions rarely notices how much it is doing so.
The hard aspects (square or opposition)
The square and the opposition make the intensity harder to place. Thought fixes on a problem and will not release it, arguments become contests, and information is treated as territory to be held. Suspicion can outrun evidence. What develops from the friction is exceptional analytical honesty, since the same scrutiny eventually turns inward, and that is where the real work of the contact gets done.
The conjunction
Conjunct, the mind and the depths are one. Attention is total or absent, with little in between. Investigation, strategy and any work requiring sustained concentration on hidden material suit the placement well. Words are used deliberately and remembered by others longer than expected. Obsessive thinking is the standing tendency, and it responds better to a demanding subject than to an attempt at relaxation.
Reading it in a chart
The orb settles how strongly this shows: a contact within a degree is a defining feature of a chart, one at the edge of the orb is a colouring. The signs the two planets occupy change the manner, the houses change the arena, and a third planet touching either of them can change the reading entirely.