| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Protagoras by Plato: Nay, Hippias, said Alcibiades; not now, but at some other time. At present
we must abide by the compact which was made between Socrates and
Protagoras, to the effect that as long as Protagoras is willing to ask,
Socrates should answer; or that if he would rather answer, then that
Socrates should ask.
I said: I wish Protagoras either to ask or answer as he is inclined; but I
would rather have done with poems and odes, if he does not object, and come
back to the question about which I was asking you at first, Protagoras, and
by your help make an end of that. The talk about the poets seems to me
like a commonplace entertainment to which a vulgar company have recourse;
who, because they are not able to converse or amuse one another, while they
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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 Within the Tides by Joseph Conrad: drawers that the first thing he heard was a shout, Great Heavens.
He looks up and there was the door open (Cloete had left the key in
the lock) and Captain Harry holding on, well above him, very fierce
in the light of the burning papers. His eyes were starting out of
his head. Thieving, he thunders at him. A sailor! An officer!
No! A wretch like you deserves no better than to be left here to
drown.
"This Stafford - on his death-bed - told the parson that when he
heard these words he went crazy again. He snatched his hand with
the revolver in it out of the drawer, and fired without aiming.
Captain Harry fell right in with a crash like a stone on top of the
Within the Tides |
