| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Records of a Family of Engineers by Robert Louis Stevenson: to another,' says my father. The verbal casting-net is thrown
in vain over these evanescent, inferential relations. Hence
the insignificance of much engineering literature. So far as
the science can be reduced to formulas or diagrams, the book
is to the point; so far as the art depends on intimate study
of the ways of nature, the author's words will too often be
found vapid. This fact - that engineering looks one way, and
literature another - was what my grand-father overlooked. All
his life long, his pen was in his hand, piling up a treasury
of knowledge, preparing himself against all possible
contingencies. Scarce anything fell under his notice but he
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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 Republic by Plato: in which they will be made to give further proof of the same qualities.
Very right, he replied.
And then, I said, we must try them with enchantments--that is the third
sort of test--and see what will be their behaviour: like those who take
colts amid noise and tumult to see if they are of a timid nature, so must
we take our youth amid terrors of some kind, and again pass them into
pleasures, and prove them more thoroughly than gold is proved in the
furnace, that we may discover whether they are armed against all
enchantments, and of a noble bearing always, good guardians of themselves
and of the music which they have learned, and retaining under all
circumstances a rhythmical and harmonious nature, such as will be most
The Republic |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Far From the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy: character. Many bathers had there prayed for a dry
death from time to time, and, like Gonzalo also, had
been unanswered; and Troy began to deem it possible
that he might be added to their number. Not a boat
of any kind was at present within sight, but far in the
distance Budmouth lay upon the sea, as it were quietly
regarding his efforts, and beside the town the harbour
showed its position by a dim meshwork of ropes and
spars. After wellnigh exhausting himself in attempts
to get back to the mouth of the cove, in his weakness
swimming several inches deeper than was his wont,
Far From the Madding Crowd |
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 Plutarch's Lives by A. H. Clough: ammunition, and engines of battery. He arrived with his fleet,
part at the port of Utica, part at Carthage; and no sooner was
he landed, but seven thousand of the enemy revolted and came
over to him, while his own forces that he brought with him
consisted of six entire legions. Here they tell us of a
pleasant incident that happened to him at his first arrival.
For some of his soldiers having by accident stumbled upon a
treasure, by which they got a good sum of money, the rest of
the army hearing this, began to fancy that the field was full of
gold and silver, which had been hid there of old by the
Carthaginians in the time of their calamities, and thereupon
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