| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Augsburg Confession by Philip Melanchthon: with divers afflictions, and to be crucified with Christ.
Moreover, they teach that every Christian ought to train and
subdue himself with bodily restraints, or bodily exercises and
labors that neither satiety nor slothfulness tempt him to sin,
but not that we may merit grace or make satisfaction for sins
by such exercises. And such external discipline ought to be
urged at all times, not only on a few and set days. So Christ
commands, Luke 21, 34: Take heed lest your hearts be
overcharged with surfeiting; also Matt. 17, 21: This kind
goeth not out but by prayer and fasting. Paul also says, 1
Cor. 9, 27: I keep under my body and bring it into subjection.
|
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 Ion by Plato: exhorting his soldiers?
ION: Yes, that is the sort of thing which the rhapsode will be sure to
know.
SOCRATES: Well, but is the art of the rhapsode the art of the general?
ION: I am sure that I should know what a general ought to say.
SOCRATES: Why, yes, Ion, because you may possibly have a knowledge of the
art of the general as well as of the rhapsode; and you may also have a
knowledge of horsemanship as well as of the lyre: and then you would know
when horses were well or ill managed. But suppose I were to ask you: By
the help of which art, Ion, do you know whether horses are well managed, by
your skill as a horseman or as a performer on the lyre--what would you
|