| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Boys' Life of Abraham Lincoln by Helen Nicolay: bull against the comet." "Do not misunderstand me. . . . I have
not decided against a proclamation of liberty to the slaves; but
hold the matter under advisement. And I can assure you that the
subject is on my mind by day and night more than any other.
Whatever shall appear to be God's will, I will do."
Four days after this interview the battle of Antietam was fought,
and when, after a few days of uncertainty it was found that it
could be reasonably claimed as a Union victory, the President
resolved to carry out his long-matured purpose. Secretary Chase
in his diary recorded very fully what occurred on that
ever-memorable September 22, 1862. After some playful talk upon
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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 Golden Threshold by Sarojini Naidu: . . . . .
Seven new moon tides at the Vesper call,
King Feroz led to Queen Gulnaar's hall
A young queen eyed like the morning star:
"I bring thee a rival, O Queen Gulnaar."
But still she gazed in her mirror and sighed:
"O King, my heart is unsatisfied."
Seven queens shone round her ivory bed,
Like seven soft gems on a silken thread,
Like seven fair lamps in a royal tower,
Like seven bright petals of Beauty's flower
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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 Koran: worlds. O my people! enter the Holy Land which God has prescribed
for you; and be ye not thrust back upon your hinder parts and
retreat losers. They said, 'O Moses! verily, therein is a people,
giants; and we will surely not enter therein until they go out from
thence; but if they go out then we will enter in.' Then said two men
of those who fear,- God had been gracious to them both,- 'Enter ye
upon them by the door, and when ye have entered it, verily, ye shall
be victorious; and upon God do ye rely if ye be believers.' They said,
'O Moses! we shall never enter it so long as they are therein; so,
go thou and thy Lord and fight ye twain; verily, we will sit down
here.' Said he, 'My Lord, verily, I can control only myself and my
The Koran |
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 Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte by Karl Marx: relation of the farmers to the French revolution.
The epoch between December 20, 1848, and the dissolution of the
constitutional assembly in May, 1849, embraces the history of the
downfall of the bourgeois republicans. After they had founded a
republic for the bourgeoisie, had driven the revolutionary proletariat
from the field and had meanwhile silenced the democratic middle class,
they are themselves shoved aside by the mass of the bourgeoisie who
justly appropriate this republic as their property. This bourgeois mass
was Royalist, however. A part thereof, the large landed proprietors,
had ruled under the restoration, hence, was Legitimist; the other part,
the aristocrats of finance and the large industrial capitalists, had
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