| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Large Catechism by Dr. Martin Luther: they should consider that they are under obligations of obedience to
God; and that, first of all, they should earnestly and faithfully
discharge their office, not only to support and provide for the bodily
necessities of their children, servants, subjects, etc., but, most of
all, to train them to the honor and praise of God. Therefore do not
think that this is left to your pleasure and arbitrary will, but that
it is a strict command and injunction of God, to whom also you must
give account for it.
But here again the sad plight arises that no one perceives or heeds
this, and all live on as though God gave us children for our pleasure
or amusement, and servants that we should employ them like a cow or
|
The fourth excerpt represents the element of Earth. It speaks of physical influences and the impact of the unseen on the visible world, and is drawn from The Troll Garden and Selected Stories by Willa Cather: to sing familiar things here at the world's end. It makes one
think how the hearts of men have carried them around the world,
into the wastes of Iceland and the jungles of Africa and the
islands of the Pacific. I think if one lived here long enough one
would quite forget how to be trivial, and would read only the great
books that we never get time to read in the world, and would
remember only the great music, and the things that are really worth
while would stand out clearly against that horizon over there. And
of course I played the intermezzo from Cavalleria Rusticana
for him; it goes rather better on an organ than most things do. He
shuffled his feet and twisted his big hands up into knots and
The Troll Garden and Selected Stories |
