| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from My Antonia by Willa Cather: were shooing chickens.
She was a spare, tall woman, a little stooped, and she was apt
to carry her head thrust forward in an attitude of attention,
as if she were looking at something, or listening to something,
far away. As I grew older, I came to believe that it was only
because she was so often thinking of things that were far away.
She was quick-footed and energetic in all her movements.
Her voice was high and rather shrill, and she often spoke
with an anxious inflection, for she was exceedingly desirous
that everything should go with due order and decorum.
Her laugh, too, was high, and perhaps a little strident,
My Antonia |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Anabasis by Xenophon: The Anabasis is his story of the march to Persia
to aid Cyrus, who enlisted Greek help to try and
take the throne from Artaxerxes, and the ensuing
return of the Greeks, in which Xenophon played a
leading role. This occurred between 401 B.C. and
March 399 B.C.
PREPARER'S NOTE
This was typed from Dakyns' series, "The Works of Xenophon," a
four-volume set. The complete list of Xenophon's works (though
there is doubt about some of these) is:
Work Number of books
Anabasis |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Girl with the Golden Eyes by Honore de Balzac: "She is the only woman in whom I can confide, although she has sold me
already," said Paquita, tranquilly. "My dear Adolphe, she is my
mother, a slave bought in Georgia for her rare beauty, little enough
of which remains to-day. She only speaks her native tongue."
The attitude of this woman and her eagerness to guess from the
gestures of her daughter and Henri what was passing between them, were
suddenly explained to the young man; and this explanation put him at
his ease.
"Paquita," he said, "are we never to be free then?"
"Never," she said, with an air of sadness. "Even now we have but a few
days before us."
The Girl with the Golden Eyes |
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 Polity of Athenians and Lacedaemonians by Xenophon: for the second time the king does sacrifice[6] to Zeus and Athena; and
as soon as the offerings are accepted by those two divinities he steps
across the boundaries of the land. And all the while the fire from
those sacrifices leads the way, and is never suffered to go out.
Behind follow beasts for sacrifice of every sort.
[4] Lit. reading {kai oi sun auto}, after L. Dindorf, "he and those
with him."
[5] Lit. "the Purphuros." See Nic. Damasc. ap. Stob. "Fl." 44, 41;
Hesych. ap. Schneider, n. ad loc.
[6] These are the {diabateria}, so often mentioned in the "Hellenica."
Invariably when he offers sacrifice the king begins the work in the
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