| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Hero of Our Time by M.Y. Lermontov: walk on the rampart any more.'
"In the evening I had a lengthy explanation
with him. I was vexed that his feelings towards
the poor girl had changed; to say nothing of his
spending half the day hunting, his manner
towards her had become cold. He rarely caressed
her, and she was beginning perceptibly to pine
away; her little face was becoming drawn,
her large eyes growing dim.
"'What are you sighing for, Bela?' I would
ask her. 'Are you sad?'
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Reminiscences of Tolstoy by Leo Tolstoy: send it back as it stood, because no one but my mother could make
head or tail of the tangle of conventional signs, transpositions,
and erasures.
My mother would sit up all night copying the whole thing out
afresh.
In the morning there would lie the pages on her table,
neatly piled together, covered all over with her fine, clear
handwriting, and everything ready so that when
"Lyovótchka" got up he could send the proof-sheets off by
post.
¹Pazanki, tracks of a hare, name given to the
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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 Odyssey by Homer: hard of heart, how may another of the many men there be
come ever to thee again, seeing that thy deeds have been
lawless?"
'So I spake, and he took the cup and drank it off, and
found great delight in drinking the sweet draught, and
asked me for it yet a second time:
'"Give it me again of thy grace, and tell me thy name
straightway, that I may give thee a stranger's gift,
wherein thou mayest be glad. Yea for the earth, the
grain-giver, bears for the Cyclopes the mighty clusters of
the juice of the grape, and the rain of Zeus gives them
The Odyssey |
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 Alexandria and her Schools by Charles Kingsley: Word speaking to his reason and conscience? With this question Plotinus
grapples, earnestly, shrewdly, fairly. If you wish to see how he does
it, you should read the fourth and fifth books of the sixth Ennead,
especially if you be lucky enough to light on a copy of that rare book,
Taylor's faithful though crabbed translation.
Not that the result of his search is altogether satisfactory. He enters
into subtle and severe disquisitions concerning soul. Whether it is one
or many. How it can be both one and many. He has the strongest
perception that, to use the noble saying of the Germans, "Time and Space
are no gods." He sees clearly that the soul, and the whole unseen world
of truly existing being, is independent of time and space: and yet,
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