| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Battle of the Books by Jonathan Swift: than phrases borrowed from religion, or founded upon no firmer
principles? And is our language so poor that we cannot find other
terms to express them? Are envy, pride, avarice, and ambition such
ill nomenclators, that they cannot furnish appellations for their
owners? Will not heydukes and mamalukes, mandarins and patshaws,
or any other words formed at pleasure, serve to distinguish those
who are in the ministry from others who would be in it if they
could? What, for instance, is easier than to vary the form of
speech, and instead of the word church, make it a question in
politics, whether the monument be in danger? Because religion was
nearest at hand to furnish a few convenient phrases, is 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 Fisherman's Luck by Henry van Dyke: thoughts.
At about nine o'clock Saturday night, they anchored their boat on
the edge of the shoal where the big eddy swings around, put out the
lantern and began to fish. Beekman sat in the bow of the boat, with
his rod over the left side; Cornelia in the stern, with her rod over
the right side. The night was cloudy and very black. Each of them
had put on the largest possible fly, one a "Bee-Pond" and the other
a "Dragon;" but even these were invisible. They measured out the
right length of line, and let the flies drift back until they hung
over the shoal, in the curly water where the two currents meet.
There were three other boats to the left of them. McTurk was their
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Ion by Plato: ION: Precisely.
SOCRATES: I wish you would frankly tell me, Ion, what I am going to ask of
you: When you produce the greatest effect upon the audience in the
recitation of some striking passage, such as the apparition of Odysseus
leaping forth on the floor, recognized by the suitors and casting his
arrows at his feet, or the description of Achilles rushing at Hector, or
the sorrows of Andromache, Hecuba, or Priam,--are you in your right mind?
Are you not carried out of yourself, and does not your soul in an ecstasy
seem to be among the persons or places of which you are speaking, whether
they are in Ithaca or in Troy or whatever may be the scene of the poem?
ION: That proof strikes home to me, Socrates. For I must frankly confess
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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 Flower Fables by Louisa May Alcott: "Ah, you will not love me any more if I should tell you all,"
said Annie, while the tears began to fall again; "I am not happy,
for I am not good; how shall I learn to be a patient, gentle child?
good little Fairy, will you teach me how?"
"Gladly will I aid you, Annie, and if you truly wish to be
a happy child, you first must learn to conquer many passions that
you cherish now, and make your heart a home for gentle feelings and
happy thoughts; the task is hard, but I will give this fairy flower
to help and counsel you. Bend hither, that I may place it in your
breast; no hand can take it hence, till I unsay the spell that
holds it there."
Flower Fables |
