During the Renaissance, the five senses were understood to form a hierarchical system from the highest sense of vision down to touch. Vision was correlated to fire and light, hearing to air, smell to vapour, taste to water, and touch to earth.
Perhaps the human fascination with fire stems from the totality of its sensory stimulation. The fire gives a flickering and glowing light, ever moving, ever changing. It crackles and hisses and fills the room with the smells of smoke and wood and perhaps even food. It penetrates us with its warmth. Every sense is stimulated and all of their associated modes of perception, such as memory and an awareness of time, are also brought into play, focused on the one experience of the fire. Together they create such an intense feeling of reality, of the "here and nowness" of the moment, that the fire becomes completely captivating.
The Indian stone temple also included, in its architectural form, the means for being blessed by the four elements—earth, wind, water, fire.
Before entering the temple gates, one removed one's shoes to touch and be blessed by the earth.
Then upon passing through the temple gateway, one is blessed by the air with a gust of wind.
A blessing by water is obtained by bathing in the temple tank, or at least descending its steps to touch the water.
Finally, on entering the cool interior of the sanctuary, the worshipper is given a mark on the forehead with ashes taken from a sacred flame by an attendant priest. Even this blessing by fire has a slight cooling sensation to it.
Perhaps it is only coincidental that each of these four blessings is associated with a cooling sensation; and yet, the use of forms and materials that inevitably create coolness is quite remarkable.