| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Cratylus by Plato: of the human soul, but they were not yet awakened into consciousness and
had not found names for themselves, or terms by which they might be
expressed. Of these beginnings of the study of language we know little,
and there necessarily arises an obscurity when the surroundings of such a
work as the Cratylus are taken away. Moreover, in this, as in most of the
dialogues of Plato, allowance has to be made for the character of Socrates.
For the theory of language can only be propounded by him in a manner which
is consistent with his own profession of ignorance. Hence his ridicule of
the new school of etymology is interspersed with many declarations 'that he
knows nothing,' 'that he has learned from Euthyphro,' and the like. Even
the truest things which he says are depreciated by himself. He professes
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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 Secrets of the Princesse de Cadignan by Honore de Balzac: the Duchesse de Chaulieu! Though we have both encountered men of
genius, they were either too far removed from us or too busy, and we
too absorbed, too frivolous."
"Ah! how I wish I might not leave this world without knowing the
happiness of true love," exclaimed the princess.
"It is nothing to inspire it," said Madame d'Espard; "the thing is to
feel it. I see many women who are only the pretext for a passion
without being both its cause and its effect."
"The last love I inspired was a beautiful and sacred thing," said the
princess. "It had a future in it. Chance had brought me, for once in a
way, the man of genius who is due to us, and yet so difficult to
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