| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from In the Cage by Henry James: different persons under different names. She had seen all sorts of
things and pieced together all sorts of mysteries. There had once
been one--not long before--who, without winking, sent off five over
five different signatures. Perhaps these represented five
different friends who had asked her--all women, just as perhaps now
Mary and Cissy, or one or other of them, were wiring by deputy.
Sometimes she put in too much--too much of her own sense; sometimes
she put in too little; and in either case this often came round to
her afterwards, for she had an extraordinary way of keeping clues.
When she noticed she noticed; that was what it came to. There were
days and days, there were weeks sometimes, of vacancy. This arose
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Smalcald Articles by Dr. Martin Luther: little have they had the power to [sunder and] separate such
creatures of God, or to forbid them from living [and
cohabiting] honestly in marriage with one another. Therefore
we are unwilling to assent to their abominable celibacy, nor
will we [even] tolerate it, but we wish to have marriage free
as God has instituted [and ordained] it, and we wish neither
to rescind nor hinder His work; for Paul says, 1 Tim. 4, 1
ff., that this [prohibition of marriage] is a doctrine of
devils.
XII. Of the Church.
We do not concede to them that they are the Church, and [in
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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 The Complete Angler by Izaak Walton: in a month; the Trout in four months; and the Salmon in the like time,
if he gets into the sea, and after into fresh water.
Roaches be accounted much better in the river than in a pond, though
ponds usually breed the biggest. But there is a kind of bastard small
Roach, that breeds in ponds, with a very forked tail, and of a very small
size; which some say is bred by the Bream and right Roach; and some
ponds are stored with these beyond belief; and knowing-men, that know
their difference, call them Ruds: they differ from the true Roach, as
much as a Herring from a Pilchard. And these bastard breed of Roach
are now scattered in many rivers: but I think not in the Thames, which I
believe affords the largest and fattest in this nation, especially below
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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 Egmont by Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe: which Spain has hitherto so anxiously sought a pretext. With a single nod
you will excite to the direst confusion what, with patient effort, we have so
long kept in abeyance. Think of the towns, the nobles, the people; think of
commerce, agriculture, trade! Realize the murder, the desolation! Calmly
the soldier beholds his comrade fall beside him in the battlefield. But
towards you, carried downwards by the stream, shall float the corpses of
citizens, of children, of maidens, till, aghast with horror, you shall no
longer know whose cause you are defending, since you shall see those, for
whose liberty you drew the sword, perishing around you. And what will be
your emotions when conscience whispers, "It was for my own safety that I
drew it "?
Egmont |
