| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Crito by Plato: city, and made our acquaintance, he may go where he pleases and take his
goods with him. None of us laws will forbid him or interfere with him.
Any one who does not like us and the city, and who wants to emigrate to a
colony or to any other city, may go where he likes, retaining his property.
But he who has experience of the manner in which we order justice and
administer the state, and still remains, has entered into an implied
contract that he will do as we command him. And he who disobeys us is, as
we maintain, thrice wrong: first, because in disobeying us he is
disobeying his parents; secondly, because we are the authors of his
education; thirdly, because he has made an agreement with us that he will
duly obey our commands; and he neither obeys them nor convinces us that our
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe: Friday and the two men who came on shore with the captain. They
conveyed them to the cave as to a prison: and it was, indeed, a
dismal place, especially to men in their condition. The others I
ordered to my bower, as I called it, of which I have given a full
description: and as it was fenced in, and they pinioned, the place
was secure enough, considering they were upon their behaviour.
To these in the morning I sent the captain, who was to enter into a
parley with them; in a word, to try them, and tell me whether he
thought they might be trusted or not to go on board and surprise
the ship. He talked to them of the injury done him, of the
condition they were brought to, and that though the governor had
Robinson Crusoe |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) by Dante Alighieri: "That soul up there which has the greatest pain,"
The Master said, "is Judas Iscariot;
With head inside, he plies his legs without.
Of the two others, who head downward are,
The one who hangs from the black jowl is Brutus;
See how he writhes himself, and speaks no word.
And the other, who so stalwart seems, is Cassius.
But night is reascending, and 'tis time
That we depart, for we have seen the whole."
As seemed him good, I clasped him round the neck,
And he the vantage seized of time and place,
The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) |
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 The Snow Image by Nathaniel Hawthorne: had not room for another drop, and the continual gush of water
made a tremor on the surface, there was a secret charm that
forbade it to overflow. I remember, that when I had slaked my
summer thirst, and sat panting by the cistern, it was my fanciful
theory that Nature could not afford to lavish so pure a liquid,
as she does the waters of all meaner fountains.
While the moon was hanging almost perpendicularly over this spot,
two figures appeared on the summit of the hill, and came with
noiseless footsteps down towards the spring. They were then in
the first freshness of youth; nor is there a wrinkle now on
either of their brows, and yet they wore a strange, old-fashioned
The Snow Image |
