| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Marvelous Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum: stepped a leg into a gopher-hole and stumbled head-over-heels to the ground,
where it lay upon its back, frantically waving its four legs in the air.
Tip ran up to it.
"You're a nice sort of a horse, I must say!" he exclaimed. "Why didn't you
stop when I yelled 'whoa?'"
"Does 'whoa' mean to stop?" asked the Saw-Horse, in a surprised voice, as it
rolled its eyes upward to look at the boy.
"Of course it does," answered Tip.
"And a hole in the ground means to stop, also, doesn't it?" continued the
horse.
"To be sure; unless you step over it," said Tip.
The Marvelous Land of Oz |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Crowd by Gustave le Bon: factor that order may proceed from chaos. 4. POLITICAL AND
SOCIAL INSTITUTIONS. Erroneous idea of their part--Their
influence extremely weak--They are effects, not causes--Nations
are incapable of choosing what appear to them the best
institutions--Institutions are labels which shelter the most
dissimilar things under the same title-- How institutions may
come to be created--Certain institutions theoretically bad, such
as centralisation obligatory for certain nations. 5.
INSTITUTIONS AND EDUCATION. Falsity of prevalent ideas as to the
influence of instruction on crowds-- Statistical
indications--Demoralising effect of Latin system of
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Twilight Land by Howard Pyle: still had around his waist the belt with the legend that he
himself had worked upon it.
"Aye," piped the Tailor in a keen, high voice, "tis true I have
a story inside of me. Tis about another tailor who had a great,
big, black, ugly demon to wait upon him and to sew his clothes
for him."
"And the name of that story, my friend," said the Soldier who had
cheated the Devil, "is what?"
"It hath no name," piped the little Tailor, "but I will give it
one, and it shall be--
Woman's Wit.
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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 Symposium by Plato: want, and is not merely the love of the congenial or of the whole, but (as
he adds) of the good; from Agathon, that love is of beauty, not however of
beauty only, but of birth in beauty. As it would be out of character for
Socrates to make a lengthened harangue, the speech takes the form of a
dialogue between Socrates and a mysterious woman of foreign extraction.
She elicits the final truth from one who knows nothing, and who, speaking
by the lips of another, and himself a despiser of rhetoric, is proved also
to be the most consummate of rhetoricians (compare Menexenus).
The last of the six discourses begins with a short argument which
overthrows not only Agathon but all the preceding speakers by the help of a
distinction which has escaped them. Extravagant praises have been ascribed
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