| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Myths and Myth-Makers by John Fiske: Helena and Sarama, carries us back historically to a time when
the scattered Indo-European tribes had not yet begun to hold
commercial and intellectual intercourse with each other, and
consequently could not have interchanged their epic materials
or their household stories. We are therefore driven to the
conclusion--which, startling as it may seem, is after all the
most natural and plausible one that can be stated--that the
Aryan nations, which have inherited from a common ancestral
stock their languages and their customs, have inherited also
from the same common original their fireside legends. They
have preserved Cinderella and Punchkin just as they have
Myths and Myth-Makers |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Symposium by Xenophon: A well-aimed argument, not wide of the mark by any means![20] the
company were thinking.
[20] Cf. Plat. "Theaet." 179 C.
Hereupon a large hoop studded with a bristling row of upright
swords[21] was introduced; and into the centre of this ring of knives
and out of it again the girl threw somersaults backwards, forwards,
several times, till the spectators were in terror of some accident;
but with the utmost coolness and without mishap the girl completed her
performance.
[21] See Becker, "Char." p. 101. Cf. Plat. "Symp." 190; "Euthyd." 294.
Here Socrates, appealing to Antisthenes: None of the present company,
The Symposium |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare: Qu. Let vs heare, sweet Bottome
Bot. Not a word of me: all that I will tell you, is, that
the Duke hath dined. Get your apparell together, good
strings to your beards, new ribbands to your pumps,
meete presently at the Palace, euery man looke ore his
part: for the short and the long is, our play is preferred:
In any case let Thisby haue cleane linnen: and let not him
that playes the Lion, paire his nailes, for they shall hang
out for the Lions clawes. And most deare Actors, eate
no Onions, nor Garlicke; for wee are to vtter sweete
breath, and I doe not doubt but to heare them say, it is a
A Midsummer Night's Dream |
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 The Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce: heretics were thrown to the mice. Jakak-Zotp, the historian, the only
Otumwump whose writings have descended to us, says that these martyrs
met their death with little dignity and much exertion. He even
attempts to exculpate the mice (such is the malice of bigotry) by
declaring that the unfortunate women perished, some from exhaustion,
some of broken necks from falling over their own feet, and some from
lack of restoratives. The mice, he avers, enjoyed the pleasures of
the chase with composure. But if "Roman history is nine-tenths
lying," we can hardly expect a smaller proportion of that rhetorical
figure in the annals of a people capable of so incredible cruelty to a
lovely women; for a hard heart has a false tongue.
The Devil's Dictionary |
