| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Symposium by Plato: by the way (Iliad).
This was the style of their conversation as they went along. Socrates
dropped behind in a fit of abstraction, and desired Aristodemus, who was
waiting, to go on before him. When he reached the house of Agathon he
found the doors wide open, and a comical thing happened. A servant coming
out met him, and led him at once into the banqueting-hall in which the
guests were reclining, for the banquet was about to begin. Welcome,
Aristodemus, said Agathon, as soon as he appeared--you are just in time to
sup with us; if you come on any other matter put it off, and make one of
us, as I was looking for you yesterday and meant to have asked you, if I
could have found you. But what have you done with Socrates?
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Lin McLean by Owen Wister: were gone rushing up the road to the graveyard.
The fiddle had lately ceased, and no dancers stayed any longer in the
hall. Eastward the rose and gold began to flow down upon the plain over
the tops of the distant hills. Of the revellers, many had never gone to
bed, and many now were already risen from their excesses to revive in the
cool glory of the morning. Some were drinking to stay their hunger until
breakfast; some splashed and sported in the river, calling and joking;
and across the river some were holding horse-races upon the level beyond
the hog-ranch. Drybone air rang with them. Their lusty, wandering shouts
broke out in gusts of hilarity. Their pistols, aimed at cans or prairie
dogs or anything, cracked as they galloped at large. Their speeding,
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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 Lady Baltimore by Owen Wister: presses that squirt some of the hardest propositions into Wall Street.
He's just back from buying a railroad, and four or five mines in Mexico.
Bohm represents Christianity in the firm. At Newport they call him the
military attache to Jerusalem. He's the big chap that sat behind me in
the car. He'll marry Kitty as soon as she can get her divorce. Bohm's a
jolly old sort--and I tell you, you old sourbelly, you're letting this
Southern moss grow over you a bit. Hey? What? Yellow rich isn't half
bad, and I'll say it myself, and pretend it's mine; but hang it, old man,
their children won't be worse than lemon-colored, and the grandchildren
will be white!"
"Just in time," I exclaimed, "to take a back seat with their evaporated
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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 Tao Teh King by Lao-tze: his; he achieves his merit and does not rest (arrogantly) in it:--he
does not wish to display his superiority.
78. 1. There is nothing in the world more soft and weak than water,
and yet for attacking things that are firm and strong there is nothing
that can take precedence of it;--for there is nothing (so effectual)
for which it can be changed.
2. Every one in the world knows that the soft overcomes the hard, and
the weak the strong, but no one is able to carry it out in practice.
3. Therefore a sage has said,
'He who accepts his state's reproach,
Is hailed therefore its altars' lord;
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