| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Large Catechism by Dr. Martin Luther: incessantly attacked, in order that no one may go on in security and
heedlessly, as though the devil were far from us, but at all times
expect and parry his blows. For though I am now chaste, patient, kind,
and in firm faith, the devil will this very hour send such an arrow
into my heart that I can scarcely stand. For he is an enemy that never
desists nor becomes tired, so that when one temptation ceases, there
always arise others and fresh ones.
Accordingly, there is no help or comfort except to run hither and to
take hold of the Lord's Prayer, and thus speak to God from the heart:
Dear Father, Thou hast bidden me pray; let me not relapse because of
temptations. Then you will see that they must desist, and finally
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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 Essays & Lectures by Oscar Wilde: inaccurate. The prayer of Plato's ideal City - [Greek text which
cannot be reproduced], might be written as a text over the door of
the last Temple to Humanity raised by the disciples of Fourier and
Saint-Simon, but it is certainly true that their ideal principle
was order and permanence, not indefinite progress. For, setting
aside the artistic prejudices which would have led the Greeks to
reject this idea of unlimited improvement, we may note that the
modern conception of progress rests partly on the new enthusiasm
and worship of humanity, partly on the splendid hopes of material
improvements in civilisation which applied science has held out to
us, two influences from which ancient Greek thought seems to have
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