The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Pagan and Christian Creeds by Edward Carpenter: after," then, as I have said already, the mind projects
on the background of Nature similarly rational Presences
which we may call 'Gods'; and at that stage 'Religion'
begins. Before that, when the mind is quite unformed
and dream-like, and consists chiefly of broken and scattered
rays, and when distinct self-consciousness is hardly
yet developed, then the presences imagined in Nature are
merely flickering and intermittent phantoms, and their
propitiation and placation comes more properly under, the
head of 'Magic.']
So much for the genesis of the religious ideas of Sin
 Pagan and Christian Creeds |
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 Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton: kept him silent.
"I want," she went on, "to be perfectly honest with
you--and with myself. For a long time I've hoped this
chance would come: that I might tell you how you've
helped me, what you've made of me--"
Archer sat staring beneath frowning brows. He
interrupted her with a laugh. "And what do you make out
that you've made of me?"
She paled a little. "Of you?"
"Yes: for I'm of your making much more than you
ever were of mine. I'm the man who married one
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