| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Polity of Athenians and Lacedaemonians by Xenophon: [2] Reading after Cobet, {en touto}.
As to food,[3] his ordinance allowed them so much as, while not
inducing repletion, should guard them from actual want. And, in fact,
there are many exceptional[4] dishes in the shape of game supplied
from the hunting field. Or, as a substitute for these, rich men will
occasionally garnish the feast with wheaten loaves. So that from
beginning to end, till the mess breaks up, the common board is never
stinted for viands, nor yet extravagantly furnished.
[3] See Plut. "Lycurg." 12 (Clough, i. 97).
[4] {paraloga}, i.e. unexpected dishes, technically named {epaikla}
(hors d'oeuvres), as we learn from Athenaeus, iv. 140, 141.
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Wife, et al by Anton Chekhov: There I will look through them and tell you what I think about it
tomorrow. Have you any more papers?" I asked, arranging the
exercise books and sheets of papers in piles.
"Take them, take them all!" said my wife, helping me to arrange
them, and big tears ran down her cheeks. "Take it all! That's all
that was left me in life. . . . Take the last."
"Ach! Natalie, Natalie!" I sighed reproachfully.
She opened the drawer in the table and began flinging the papers
out of it on the table at random, poking me in the chest with her
elbow and brushing my face with her hair; as she did so, copper
coins kept dropping upon my knees and on the floor.
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Adam Bede by George Eliot: Arthur clapped his hands continually and cried "Bravo!" But Ben
had one admirer whose eyes followed his movements with a fervid
gravity that equalled his own. It was Martin Poyser, who was
seated on a bench, with Tommy between his legs.
"What dost think o' that?" he said to his wife. "He goes as pat
to the music as if he was made o' clockwork. I used to be a
pretty good un at dancing myself when I was lighter, but I could
niver ha' hit it just to th' hair like that."
"It's little matter what his limbs are, to my thinking," re-turned
Mrs. Poyser. "He's empty enough i' the upper story, or he'd niver
come jigging an' stamping i' that way, like a mad grasshopper, for
Adam Bede |
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 King James Bible: are approved may be made manifest among you.
CO1 11:20 When ye come together therefore into one place, this is not
to eat the Lord's supper.
CO1 11:21 For in eating every one taketh before other his own supper:
and one is hungry, and another is drunken.
CO1 11:22 What? have ye not houses to eat and to drink in? or despise
ye the church of God, and shame them that have not? what shall I say to
you? shall I praise you in this? I praise you not.
CO1 11:23 For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered
unto you, that the Lord Jesus the same night in which he was betrayed
took bread:
King James Bible |
