| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Parmenides by Plato: there might, perhaps, have seemed to be an irreverence in doing so. About
the Divine Being Himself, in whom all true theological ideas live and move,
men have spoken and reasoned much, and have fancied that they instinctively
know Him. But they hardly suspect that under the name of God even
Christians have included two characters or natures as much opposed as the
good and evil principle of the Persians.
To have the true use of words we must compare them with things; in using
them we acknowledge that they seldom give a perfect representation of our
meaning. In like manner when we interrogate our ideas we find that we are
not using them always in the sense which we supposed. And Plato, while he
criticizes the inconsistency of his own doctrine of universals and draws
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from La Grande Breteche by Honore de Balzac: talk.'
"After chatting with me for a few minutes, my hostess left me a prey
to vague and sinister thoughts, to romantic curiosity, and a religious
dread, not unlike the deep emotion which comes upon us when we go into
a dark church at night and discern a feeble light glimmering under a
lofty vault--a dim figure glides across--the sweep of a gown or of a
priest's cassock is audible--and we shiver! La Grande Breteche, with
its rank grasses, its shuttered windows, its rusty iron-work, its
locked doors, its deserted rooms, suddenly rose before me in fantastic
vividness. I tried to get into the mysterious dwelling to search out
the heart of this solemn story, this drama which had killed three
La Grande Breteche |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Maid Marian by Thomas Love Peacock: mean by the altar."
The foresters did as the friar directed.
"Now, Little John," said the friar, "on with the cloak
of the abbot of Doubleflask. I appoint thee my clerk:
thou art here duly elected in full mote."
"I wish you were all in full moat together," said the baron,
"and smooth wall on both sides."
"Punnest thou?" said the friar. "A heinous anti-christian offence.
Why anti-christian? Because anti-catholic? Why anti-catholic? Because
anti-roman. Why anti-roman? Because Carthaginian. Is not pun from
Punic? punica fides: the very quint-essential quiddity of bad faith:
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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 Margret Howth: A Story of To-day by Rebecca Harding Davis: Nothing. Yet something in the girl's face made her think that
these hills, this air and sky, were in fact alive to her,--real;
that her soul, being lower, it might be, than ours, lay closer to
Nature, knew the language of the changing day, of these
earnest-faced hills, of the very worms crawling through the brown
mould. It was an idle fancy; Margret laughed at herself for it,
and turned to watch the slow morning-struggle which Lois followed
with such eager eyes.
The light was conquering. Up the gray arch the soft, dewy blue
crept gently, deepening, broadening; below it, the level bars of
light struck full on the sullen black of the west, and worked
Margret Howth: A Story of To-day |
