| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Euthydemus by Plato: which Ctesippus and all of them with one voice vehemently assented, and bid
him exhibit the power of his wisdom. Then I said: O Euthydemus and
Dionysodorus, I earnestly request you to do myself and the company the
favour to exhibit. There may be some trouble in giving the whole
exhibition; but tell me one thing,--can you make a good man of him only who
is already convinced that he ought to learn of you, or of him also who is
not convinced, either because he imagines that virtue is a thing which
cannot be taught at all, or that you are not the teachers of it? Has your
art power to persuade him, who is of the latter temper of mind, that virtue
can be taught; and that you are the men from whom he will best learn it?
Certainly, Socrates, said Dionysodorus; our art will do both.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from At the Sign of the Cat & Racket by Honore de Balzac: met him in the Champs-Elysees. He was on horseback. Well, at one
minute he was galloping as hard as he could tear, and then pulled up
to a walk. I said to myself at that moment, 'There is a man devoid of
judgement.' "
"Ah, ha!" cried Monsieur Guillaume, "how wise I was to have your money
settled on yourself with such a queer fellow for a husband!"
When Augustine was so imprudent as to set forth her serious grievances
against her husband, the two old people were speechless with
indignation. But the word "divorce" was ere long spoken by Madame
Guillaume. At the sound of the word divorce the apathetic old draper
seemed to wake up. Prompted by his love for his daughter, and also by
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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 Maria, or the Wrongs of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft: which soon after occurred, rendered all these virtues palpable.
[The incident is perhaps worth relating on other accounts, and
therefore I shall describe it distinctly.]
"I had a great affection for my nurse, old Mary, for whom I
used often to work, to spare her eyes. Mary had a younger sister,
married to a sailor, while she was suckling me; for my mother only
suckled my eldest brother, which might be the cause of her
extraordinary partiality. Peggy, Mary's sister, lived with her,
till her husband, becoming a mate in a West-Indian trader, got a
little before-hand in the world. He wrote to his wife from the
first port in the Channel, after his most successful voyage, to
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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 A treatise on Good Works by Dr. Martin Luther: thoughts, in the Second, that of our mouth in words, in this
Third is prescribed our attitude toward God in works; and it is
the first and right table of Moses, on which these three
Commandments are written, and they govern man on the right side,
namely, in the things which concern God, and in which God has to
do with man and man with God, without the mediation of any
creature.
The first works of this Commandment are plain and outward, which
we commonly call worship, such as going to mass, praying, and
hearing a sermon on holy days. So understood there are very few
works in this Commandment; and these, if they are not done in
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